The Returned, Part III Read online

  The front door slid open and McHenry stared outside. He blinked several times in disbelief, unable to accept what he was looking at.

  It was a procession of ancient Roman soldiers.

  From a fast count, they seemed to be lined up twenty across, and their ranks stretched back as far as he could see. They were marching in perfect precision, their legs matching stride. They were humans, not Thallonians—which made sense, since they were Romans. Each of them was wearing golden armor plating on his tunic and a white skirt that swirled around his upper thighs. Each also sported sandals that laced up to his knees. Each of them had a sword that slapped against his hips and a shield on his left arm. It was as if they were marching decisively into some manner of battle. McHenry wondered if, with a roar, they would charge in unison at the house and try to destroy everyone in it.

  Then he saw that they were carrying something. Eight soldiers, four in front and four in back, were transporting a litter. It was extremely ornate. It had a domed roof that seemed to be carved of solid oak—or perhaps maple—which had been painted gold. At least, McHenry assumed it was simply painted, since that much solid gold would have been inordinately heavy. There were curtains hanging around the entirety of it, making it impossible for him to see who was riding within it. On the other hand, he was reasonably sure he knew who it was.

  The front row of soldiers came to a halt about ten feet short of the front of the house, and the ones behind them likewise stopped. The ones hauling the litter, however, continued forward. The soldiers who were in their path stepped aside so that the litter could be brought to the front. They set it down on the four legs that were beneath it.

  The curtains on the left were pulled aside and Q stepped down from the litter. He was dressed in a toga, with a white undergarment and purple cloth draped over it. He had a crown of golden leaves around his head. He stood there for a moment, his arms spread to either side.

  “What do you think? Too much?”

  “I think the litter may be a bit over-the-top.”

  “It’s not a ‘litter,’ ” Q said archly. “It’s called a lectica.”

  “Whatever. What are you doing here?”

  Q snapped his fingers, and a scroll appeared in his hand. He unrolled it and held it up, then spoke in the manner of one making an important pronouncement. “This is to inform you that you are summoned to appear in the great coliseum at sunset. There you will engage in a series of battles to prove your worth to me and to the people of New Thallon.”

  “I don’t have to prove anything to anyone.”

  Q lowered the scroll and gazed at him curiously. “Is that what you believe?”

  “It is.”

  “All right, then. If that is your answer, we will go with the secondary plan. I will kill Robin Lefler and her child right here, right now. When you are looking for the individual to blame for their grisly fate, you will have to look no farther than the nearest mirror. Is that acceptable to you?”

  McHenry froze. He had no idea how to respond. He was uncertain if he could prevent Q from simply annihilating them. He had no confidence that whatever power he had would be up to that challenge.

  And then Robin was standing behind him. Very softly, she said, “Do it.”

  He turned and looked at her. “What?”

  “Do it,” she repeated. She clutched Cwansi tightly. “Step aside. Don’t submit to his games. If we have to die because of that, then that’s fine.”

  “No, it’s not fine!”

  “Mark, I’m not going to do it.” She raised her voice, presumably so that Q could hear her words. “I’m not going to let you get pulled into some sort of demented Roman fight in a coliseum. Which, by the way, we don’t have. There’s no coliseum or any manner of arena on New Thallon.”

  “There is now,” said Q. “I have some very nice seats for you if you’re interested in coming to watch.”

  “I’m not going to watch anything, because I’m not going to let him do it!”

  “I’m afraid that you don’t have any say in the matter.”

  “I very much do. Mark is my friend, not your plaything.” She pushed McHenry to the side and faced up to Q, who was grinning. “He has already gone far beyond anything that any person can reasonably expect in order to protect me and my son. This is as far as it goes. This is where it ends. If you’re going to kill us, then kill us.”

  “You are quite brave with the safety of yourself and your child,” said Q. “Are you operating under the assumption that I won’t do what I say I’ll do?”

  “I think you put yourself forward as some sort of advanced being. And I think that a creature that is as advanced as you claim to be isn’t simply going to kill two people—one of them a small child—for no reason. But if you believe that you have to destroy us, even though we’ve done nothing to you . . . then go ahead. Destroy us.”

  “All right,” said Q.

  He snapped his fingers.

  Robin’s eyes went wide and she sank to her knees. Her mouth was open wide and she was trying to suck in air, but she was unable to do so. Cwansi was writhing on her shoulders. Her arms went limp and the baby slid to the floor. Cwansi was shaking violently, his hands clutching at his chest, his face masked in confusion.

  “In case you’re wondering, I removed their lungs,” Q said as casually as if they were discussing the weather. “It should only require less than a minute for them to die. You can stand there and watch them, if you wish.”

  Robin was flopping on the ground as if she were a fish that had just been pulled onto land. Cwansi had already stopped moving, his glassy eyes staring upward.

  “All right! All right!” McHenry shouted. “Whatever you want! Just fix them!”

  Q snapped his fingers a second time, and suddenly Robin was gulping in deep lungfuls of air. Cwansi’s voice erupted in a hysterical cry as he gasped air greedily into his newly restored lungs. Robin crawled across the ground and scooped him up, cradling him.

  The Roman soldiers did not react at all. They simply stared resolutely forward, as if they had not seen a woman and child nearly snuffed out in front of them. McHenry wasn’t even sure they were really alive.

  “I’m glad you saw reason,” said Q.

  “Saw reason? You were killing them while I was standing there!”

  “If I’d known that was an issue, I would have invited you to walk away. Now”—Q clapped his hands together briskly—“you will be at the coliseum this evening? Just before sundown?”

  “No,” Robin started to say, shaking her head.

  McHenry turned on her and said angrily, “Shut up, Robin! You don’t get a vote! You don’t get to die just to save me aggravation! Just take care of Cwansi and leave this to me!”

  “That’s the way to talk to her,” Q said approvingly.

  “You shut up, too! I’ve no idea why you’re doing this. Why you’re knuckling under to Shintar Han—”

  “‘Knuckling under’?” Q sounded amused by the concept. “This has nothing to do with Shintar Han. I don’t care if he achieves the power he wants. I don’t care what happens to him. You could go over to his office right now and stab a knife into his chest, and it wouldn’t bother me. In fact, if you’d like, we can both go over. I’ll hold him still for you.”

  McHenry actually considered it for a moment before dispensing with the idea. More blood wasn’t going to solve the problem. “Then why? Why are you doing this?”

  “You keep asking me that! What answer could I give that would possibly satisfy you?”

  “The truth.”

  “The truth is, McHenry, that you interest me. You still have a curious attachment to your human roots. That limits you. You know that limits you. And that doesn’t seem to bother you. That’s unfathomable to me, and so I want to understand it. The only way that I can do that is to test you to the fullest extent of your abilities. I
f you survive—or, more important, if I allow you to survive—then you can continue your limited life alongside Miss Lefler here. If, on the other hand, you don’t survive, well, then . . .” He shrugged. “You don’t survive. But that’s going to very much be up to you.”

  “But it seems you’re calling the shots, Q.”

  “I always am,” said Q cheerfully.

  “So where is this coliseum you’re talking about?”

  “Oh, don’t worry. You’ll be able to find it. Everyone will be able to find it. And once you have, oooh, how much fun we’re all going to have.”

  And, with that, Q vanished. He didn’t even bother to climb back into the litter but instead simply disappeared. The instant he did, the Roman legions that had accompanied him likewise snapped out of existence, leaving McHenry, Lefler, and Cwansi standing there, staring at nothing.

  Robin had managed to calm down the hysterical Cwansi, who was naturally still shaken from almost smothering to death for reasons that he could not comprehend. McHenry turned to face her and said angrily, “You shouldn’t have done that. You shouldn’t have been willing to throw away your life just to spare me.”

  “He was right. I didn’t think he’d do it.” She was still seated on the ground and she was rocking Cwansi back and forth. “I didn’t think he would murder us. And the fact is that we don’t know if he would have. I still think he’d have spared us.”

  “Based on what?”

  “Opinion, okay? My opinion.”

  Indi had come up behind Robin, and she helped her to get up. Robin muttered her thanks as she stood.

  “Well, I’m not ready to throw away your life based on your opinion,” McHenry said tightly. “And if I have to go up against him in this whole coliseum scenario in order to save your lives, then that’s what I’m prepared to do. And that’s just something you’re going to have to live with.”

  “And what if we don’t? What if you go along with Q on this insane thing and you wind up losing and he kills all three of us?”

  “Then at least we die together.” McHenry took a deep breath and let it out slowly. The anger that had been pounding through him seemed to dissipate. “That would be fine by me. Much better than just standing around and letting you die. I couldn’t live with that. Okay? I just . . . I couldn’t.”

  The defensiveness that she’d been feeling toward McHenry’s obvious ire with her dissolved. “It’s okay,” she said softly, and she held out an arm toward him. He stepped in toward her, and she embraced him. “It’s all going to be okay.”

  “What if I can’t beat him?”

  “You’ll do your best. That’s all that matters.”

  They stood there for a long moment, holding each other tightly, and the rest of the world went away as they did so. Indi watched them and smiled.

  And Cwansi, balanced on his mother’s shoulder, drifted to sleep.

  Then McHenry released Robin and faced Indi. “Cancel all my appointments today,” he said briskly. “I don’t want to see anyone.”

  “All right. Uhm . . . why?”

  “Because healing people takes physical effort. I don’t know what I’m going to be dealing with, so I’d rather rest up and save my resources. This whole thing is a huge unknown. Q can do whatever he wants, and all I’ll be able to do is react. So I’d best be at full strength.”

  “Yes, all right. Of course. I will contact the people scheduled to come today.”

  “Good.” He smiled grimly. “Tell them to find the coliseum and go there instead. I’m sure it’ll be a hell of a show.”

  Excalibur

  TIME SEEMED TO stretch out indefinitely.

  Burgoyne continued to watch the Dayan ship, which was illuminated on their viewscreen. S/he was positive that s/he’d been right: that the Dayan had been bluffing about killing the captain. The lack of his body floating in space seemed to indicate that s/he’d been correct in guessing that.

  But it did nothing to still hir concerns about what was going to happen next.

  S/he had ordered the engines powered down, and now the Excalibur was simply floating in space, showing as few life signs as any derelict. Still powered up were life support, transporters (in case they were required), and the cloaking device that continued to shield them from the Dayan vessel.

  Long minutes passed on the bridge without anyone saying a word. They were all equally focused on the Dayan, waiting on them. They were wondering if the ship was going to leave the area, or perhaps unleash a volley of blasts into space in hopes of striking the Excalibur through sheer dumb luck. It did neither.

  It just sat there.

  Finally Tobias spoke up. “What about Starfleet?” she said.

  Burgoyne glanced at her. “What about it?”

  “Should we contact Starfleet? Bring them up to speed? Tell them about the arrival of the Dayan and their kidnapping of the captain? This entire situation?”

  Burgoyne had already considered it. “We don’t dare. We have no idea if the Dayan are capable of tapping into our communications. If they are and we transmit to Starfleet, even in the blind, they may be able to trace our location.”

  “So if we break our silence,” said Tobias, “we’re risking their opening fire on us?”

  “That’s right.”

  “A rescue mission, then,” Kebron said firmly. He stepped from around his station, and Burgoyne stared at him. It might well have been hir imagination, but it seemed to hir as if Kebron suddenly seemed about a head higher and a half meter wider. “We put together a security strike force, beam aboard the Dayan ship, and rescue the captain.”

  “You really want to go head-to-head with the Dayan?”

  “I’ve beaten one before,” said Kebron, “in case you’ve forgotten.”

  “No, I haven’t forgotten. But you haven’t been up against ten, or twenty, or a hundred. One-on-one combat is different, and if I had an army of you, Kebron, I might consider it. But you’re only one individual, and I cannot in good conscience send you into the heart of enemy territory on a mission you likely won’t survive. If we had a thousand more in security, we could beam them aboard simultaneously . . . As it is, the odds are stacked against us.”

  “So we continue to sit here and wait for the captain to escape by himself?”

  “If anyone is capable of that, it’s Mackenzie Calhoun,” Burgoyne said firmly.

  The Dayan Vessel

  i.

  CALHOUN STARED UNCOMPREHENDINGLY at Soleta’s face. “What the hell are you doing here?” he whispered as he rubbed his sore wrists. “How did you get here? What the hell are you wearing?”

  “Prototype Romulan infiltration armor,” she said briskly. “When activated, its reflective surface bounces the entire area around it. The world itself basically camouflages it.”

  “But . . . how did you get here?”

  “I beamed myself over here just before the ship blew up. They didn’t have shields up, so I was able to penetrate their ship.”

  “Why didn’t you beam back to the Excalibur?”

  She looked away from him and said softly, “Because I didn’t feel I had a place there anymore. What I did to you . . . I can’t believe I did it. I’m not sure what the hell happened. It was disgraceful, what I did. I betrayed you, and Shelby. I betrayed myself. And so I felt the only thing I could do was try to take myself somewhere else. To start over. I figured I would hide on this ship until I could find somewhere that I could depart from. I wasn’t expecting them to kidnap you off the bridge.”

  “Yes, well, that makes two of us.” He cleared his throat and said, “Soleta, I was wondering . . . what happened between us. Could that have been Pon farr? Could you literally not have been in control of yourself?” Calhoun knew very little about the Vulcan mating ritual. Due to concerns over Vulcan sensitivity to such a personal and private matter, it was not discussed. Rumors tended to cir
culate among Academy cadets, but he’d never had the opportunity to actually discuss it with anyone who was Vulcan. Or, in Soleta’s case, half-Vulcan. “I mean, I know it’s none of my business . . . although, considering what happened between us, I suppose it is. Have you ever had any experience with the whole Vulcan mating ritual?”

  “Could we possibly discuss this some other time, Captain?” she asked with urgency. “Perhaps after we’re dead?”

  “Yes. Right. Good idea.” He glanced around the room, his mind racing. “So where do we go? You’ve been on this ship for at least a short while. Longer than I have, in any event. Is there a transporter room?”

  “Not that I’ve been able to determine. As near as I can tell, they have a central point in the ship that generates transporter beams, but those beams simply pick up people from around the ship and transport them wherever they want to go. If we’re going to make use of them, we would effectively have to storm their bridge and take over the controls.”

  “That doesn’t sound like a viable plan to me. Even if we could, we don’t have anywhere guaranteed that we could beam to. We have no reason to assume that the Excalibur is still out there.”

  “We have every reason to assume it’s still out there, sir, with all due respect. It’s your ship. They wouldn’t abandon you if you’ve been kidnapped, as much as you might wish it otherwise.”

  “I suppose you’re right,” said Calhoun.

  “We do have an alternative, though,” Soleta said. “They, like us, have an auxiliary bridge. One would assume that it has the same command functions as their main bridge. If we can access their auxiliary bridge, we can tap into the same transporter commands that their main bridge would provide us.”

  “All right. A reasonable plan. Do you know how to get there?”

  She nodded. “I’ve been wandering the ship unhindered for a bit, and I think I have a basic idea of the layout.”

  “Did you happen to spot some manner of armory?”

  “I did indeed,” she said. “It’s one deck down.”

  “Then that’s our first stop. We’re going to need to depend heavily on surprise, considering how vastly outnumbered we are.”