Chapter 9
Bridge
USS Redemption
Federation-Hegemony Border
The sounds of the bridge were hauntingly familiar to Kalara, a painful reminder of her brief time in command of this ship.
Stood above the Pit, she stared around at the various bridge officers going about their tasks and tried not to feel totally useless. She had avoided spending any time on the bridge, not wanting to put herself through the constant nagging reminders of what she had lost. Now, though, she had no choice but to remain here and imagine what might have been. For three hours.
Ambassador Benjamani had left the bridge on Sarine’s heels, seemingly having made her point. She had ordered Kalara to remain, though, to oversee the communications' process when the Laurentii finally arrived. It had not taken Kalara long to realise that what Benjamani really wanted was a spy.
How did this happen? she wondered. For an instant, she flashed back to the conversation she had had over subspace with her mother. Was Elyra right? Had she lost all honor in accepting this position with the ambassador?
She certainly hadn't acted with honor when she had intervened in Benjamani's rift with Sarine. When Benjamani had begun to pressurise the captain, Kalara had found herself stepping to the ambassador's side and whispering in her ear that under Starfleet Regulations, Sarine would have been well within his rights to banish her from the bridge unti the official diplomatic mission began.
It had sounded good at the time. Of course, it had also been a lie.
Why had she done it? She didn't have an answer. She didn't feel any obligation towards Sarine, not after what he had done to her. So why had she stopped Benjamani from needling him?
The only thing she knew for sure was that this wasn't working. She was finding it harder and harder to stand the ambassador - she was a consummate politician, a manipulator who seemed to take pleasure from manoeuvering people where she wanted them. Kalara was coming to realise more and more that she herself had been manipulated by her. Had allowed herself to be manipulated.
But she couldn't see any way out.
Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a beeping coming from the Pit below her. She blinked and focused on Lieutenant Barani at Ops. Something was flashing on her holographic screen.
"Commander, we've got something."
Prin Ly'et had been sat in the captain's chair, studying something on a holographic display that surrounded her position in a cylindrical flickering of light. She rose now and stepped through the hologram, reaching Barani in a few short strides.
"What is it?"
"A subspace aperture just opened a lightyear away. We have movement coming out of it." She paused, studying her screens, then turned back to look at Prin again. "The configuration matches known Laurentii ship design."
"Tactical display, zoom in on the Laurentii ships."
As the deck, walls and ceiling vanished in a series of holographic ripples, Kalara took a step back from the railing that surrounded the Pit and tapped her comm badge. "Kalara to Benjamani."
The ambassador took a moment to respond. When she did, her voice seemed somehow colder than usual. "Ambassador Benjamani, here. Are they here?"
Kalara bristled slightly at the other woman's tone, but she forced down her natural reaction. "Yes, ambassador."
"On my way."
Stepping back to the railing, Kalara heard Prin end a conversation with Sarine. Her attention, though, drifted to the side where a section of the holographic display had changed rendering to zoom in on the approaching Laurentii ships. Kalara barely suppressed a gasp.
The Laurentii ships were huge, larger than any vessels Kalara had ever seen. She had heard talk of the famous biological engineering capabilities of the Hegemony, but even in her wildest dreams, she had not imagined anything like this was possible.
They were alive, that much was obvious. The closest comparison Kalara could make was to a Terran water-animal that she had seen on her honeymoon with Damien. A whale. The Laurentii ships appeared to be huge, space-faring whales. Their hulls had the texture of rough skin, covered in excrescences and boils. A massive bulky main body gradually diminished to what appeared to be a serpentine like tail.
"My god," one of the MACOs at Kalara's side breathed. "They look alive."
"Commander, we're being hailed by the lead ship."
"On viewer. Full bridge domain."
Kalara quickly dropped her own view-finder down over her eye, just in time to see the sight of the Laurentii ships vanish to be replaced by her first glimpse of a Laurentii.
The alien creature was visible from the shoulders up, giving her a glimpse of a silvery material covering his body. His face, though humanoid, carried a few obvious differences from those races Kalara was used to, starting with the twilight-black eye-strip that seemed to run all the way around its head.
"This is Commander Prin Ly'et of the Federation Starship Redemption. May I be the first to--"
"Where is the Sarine?"
Kalara saw Prin tense slightly as she was cut off by the Laurentii commander. She bristled herself at the tone.
"Captain Sarine is on his way to the bridge as we speak. In the meantime--"
"Have him contact us when he is there."
The screen went blank for a moment, then reverted back to the view of the approaching Laurentii ships, now much larger. Kalara could make out a series of metallic constructs that seemed to have been implanted into the flesh of the creature-ships, obviously some kind of control and habitat modules.
Kalara felt a surge of anger at the way they had been treated by the Laurentii, but she stamped down on it firmly. This isn't my problem, she told herself. This isn't my ship. Not anymore.
Prin stood there for a moment, as if lost for words, then she turned back to her seat. As she did, she caught sight of Kalara and smiled wanly.
"Friendly, aren't they?"
Kalara could only nod. Friendly, indeed.
Bridge
Five minutes later, Sarine arrived on the bridge. Kalara had remained at her station behind the railing, so she had a good view of him as he exited the bridge. Something seemed... different about him somehow. More relaxed almost. She would have sworn he had a smile on his face.
He walked along the railing and down the steps into the Pit, accepting a headset from a young eager Ferengi ensign stood at attention beside his chair.
"What have we got, commander?" he asked Prin Ly’et.
The commander seemed as surprised as Kalara by Ba'el's strange reaction, but she recovered quickly. "Three Laurentii Behemoths dropped out of quantum slipstream space about six minutes ago. They hailed us, demanded to speak to you, and then ended the transmission. They're holding position off our starboard side."
Prin's words seemed to dampen Ba'el's spirits somewhat and he frowned when she mentioned that they had ended the transmission. Sitting forward slightly in his chair, he stared at the Laurentii ships through the holographic display, then shook his head. Standing, he turned towards the front of the bridge.
"Alright then, Lieutenant Barani. Put them on."
Kalara watched in the viewfinder as the same Laurentii commander from earlier reappeared. With a little more time to study him, she noted the lack of a nose and the strange, tiny ears, which seemed to shiver every few seconds.
"Who am I speaking to?" the Laurentii demanded.
"Who am I speaking to?" Ba'el barked right back.
The Laurentii seemed slightly taken aback by Ba'el's reaction, but he replied. "I am Juny'ar, varec of She-Who-Is-Driven-Away. Are you the Sarine?"
"I am Ba'el Sarine, captain of the USS Redemption. I represent the United Federation of Planets and request that--"
"Actually, captain, you will find that I represent the United Federation of Planets."
Kalara couldn't help wincing slightly at the sound of Benjamani's voice. She turned to see the older woman stood just outside the turbolift, staring at Sarine. She clicked her fingers at one of the ensigns, who scurried over with a spare headset. She set it on her head like a crown, then carefully placed the viewfinder down over her eye.
To Kalara's surprise, Ba'el didn't explode. He didn't make some cutting comment. Instead, he bowed his head and indicated with his arm that Benjamani should take over.
The ambassador seemed as taken aback as the Laurentii officer had been earlier. Still, she recovered quickly from her flustered state, speaking at the Laurentii.
"Kishiruru, talaca seefu dan, varec-to," she said, her mouth having difficulty making the hissing sounds seemingly included in the Seefu alphabet. She had obviously mentally deactivated the translation matrix for the time of the greeting. Looking for an edge.
"Kishiruru," the Laurentii replied. Then he went on, this time reactivating his own translator. "Now, Sarine, you will follow us."
Kalara would have sworn she saw Sarine grin as the Laurentii commander - Jun'yar - neatly bypassed the ambassador. "If you will transmit the coordinates to us, varec Jun'yar, I will instruct my navigation's officer to--"
"Surely we should exchange greetings, first, varec-to," Benjamani cut in again. Kalara thought she sounded desperate, desperate to maintain some kind of control over this conversation.
"The time for greetings is passed. The herd will flock. You must follow."
None of that made much sense to Kalara, but it seemed a clear enough indication that Benjamani should drop it. The ambassador, though, did not seem inclined to do that.
"I was told that the negotiations would begin with--"
"I do not care what you were told, kruvat. The time has passed. You will follow." From the slight shift of the incline of his head, the Laurentii was turning his attention back to Sarine. "You are the Sarine. We transmit the information. You will follow."
The transmission went dead, leaving them all staring once again at the majestic vision of the three Laurentii ships seeming to hover in space beside them. Kalara heard Benjamani mutter something behind her, and kept her eyes firmly on the viewscreen. I will not get involved. I will not get involved.
Sarine had turned to Lieutenant Barani at Ops, not paying any attention to Benjamani. He walked over to stand beside her, waiting for her to confirm that she had received the transmission. After a few moments, she turned and nodded.
"Good. Transfer those to Ensign Q'sar's station. Ensign, make the necessary calculations and transfer them to the other ships. And someone please drag Ambassador Qwert and Mister Grove out of the Alpha Quadrant."
As his people jumped to carry out their orders, Kalara sensed Benjamani draw closer. She did not turn, pretending to follow the movement of the Laurentii ships outside. Benjamani, though, didn't seem to have any intention of allowing Kalara to ignore her.
"A funny thing, Lieutenant-Commander."
Kalara made a non-committal sound in the back of her throat. Benjamani went on.
"After I left the bridge, I went to check Starfleet Regulations in the main computer."
Cursing to herself, Kalara turned and met Benjamani's gaze. If the older woman wanted to make something of this situation, she would stand and face her.
"It seems that there is no regulation allowing a captain to ban an ambassador from the bridge at any time during a diplomatic mission. I guess that was missing from your induction into Starfleet."
Kalara straightened. "Many things were."
"Indeed." Benjamani took a step closer. "Do not toy with me, Kalara. You have no idea what I'm capable of."
Kalara did not break eye contact with the other woman. She stared deep into her eyes, letting Benjamani see a hint of what lay underneath. "Neither do you."
The two women locked gazes for a moment more, then Benjamani looked away. "As long as we understand one another, Lieutenant-Commander."
As Benjamani went over to speak with one of her aides who had just arrived on the bridge, Kalara turned and looked back into the Pit. She discovered she was shaking from restrained violence. All she had wanted to do was reach up and snap the old woman's neck. She was more and more convinced that this was not working. One way or another, she had to get out from underneath Benjamani's thumb.
One way or another.
The Bowl
Deck 10
USS Redemption
Redemption's science bay, known as the Bowl, resembled a vast glass construct and took up three floors. Including a holographic stellar cartography department, numerous laboratories, and every possible scientific equipment Starfleet could get their hands on, it maintained a cold, austere atmosphere through liberal use of glass separators, and white and blue lighting.
Zoraya had been assigned a small corner in a vast laboratory, which she shared with a dozen other ensigns in Xeno-biology. Their boss, a frumpy Ferengi woman with overlarge lobes, had kept them busy running practice runs on samples taken from every Federation race she had been able to get her hands on, in preparation for their arrival in Laurentii space, when - she hoped - they would finally be able to spend some time studying some real alien biology.
Zoraya hadn’t complained though. The grunt work had given her numerous opportunities to continue her true work. Since leaving Romulan space, she had sent well over seventy-five spider programs scurrying down into Redemption's main computers. Designed by Starfleet Intelligence, the spiders were so-called because they were very good at connecting different points into a wide web of information. They were also known as cameleons for their ability to take on the code and characteristics of whichever part of a mainframe they were trawling through. As far as the techheads in S.I knew, they were absolutely untraceable.
I hope they're right, she thought. If one of them did trip an alarm, she would have a lot of explaining to do.
She sensed movement over to her left and turned to see Lieutenant Gluta, the xenobiology department head, come scurrying down the corridor. The rotund Ferengi woman seemed out of breath, as if she had been jogging.
When she reached the door into their small room, she was almost jumping up and down.
"Contact," she crowed. "We have contact people."
A murmur ran through the gathered scientists. Zoraya herself felt a surge of excitement. They had been waiting for their real job to start for days now.
"Are they onboard?" one of the ensigns, a jumpy human girl with short black hair, asked.
"Of course they're not," another ensign, a Romulan, sneered. "They won't be coming here, we'll be going there."
"Silence," Gluta cried in that shrill little voice of hers. Everyone stopped talking. Once she was sure she had all their attention, Gluta went on. "So far we only have the recording of the transmission between the bridge and the Laurentii ships that met us to work with, as well as some scans of their ships."
"Behemoths," whispered the ensign next to Zoraya, a Cardassian woman.
"We're going to form two teams and try and get as much information as we can out of both."
As Gluta began to separate them into two teams, Zoraya turned back to her station. She was only half-listening anyway, but when she saw the flashing icon on her screen, she stopped listening altogether.
Her hands shaking slightly, she tapped the icon, opening up a data transmission from one of her spider programs. This one had been directed to set up its web within Redemption's communication's sub processor and to trawl through the scraps of transmissions that came there to die. It looked as though it had found something. If she was reading it correctly, it had found a garbled, encrypted transmission made on the day of the Klingon attack. Zoraya felt her heart beat a little faster. This might actually be what she was looking for. Now if she could just...
"Would you care to join us in the real world, Ensign ? ?"
Zoraya flicked her head round to see that Gluta and all the others were staring at her. She felt her cheeks burn.
"Yes sir. Sorry sir."
"What exactly is so interesting on your screen that you feel the need to ignore me?"
Gluta began to come towards her, intent on seeing what was on Zoraya's screen. Panicking, Zoraya tried to find some way of stalling her when another Lieutenant came hurrying into their room.
"Have you heard?" he announced as soon as he was inside. "The Laurentii have agreed to hand us scans of the interiors of their stations."
Distracted by the announcement, Gluta stalled her forward motion and turned back to the man. All of the other ensigns were on their feet, excitedly asking questions of the newcomer. Zoraya took the opportunity to quickly transfer the data transmission to her personal station and then erased the message from her spider. She checked her screen to make sure there was nothing else there, and then went to join the other ensigns.
Have to admit, I have a bit of a crush on her myself. Strong, capable, sexy and ever so slightly out of control... 
Terrific stuff as always!
) but they've been friends for much too long and with much too much baggage for them to ever go back to that lover relationship they once had. More from Ba'el's point of view than Prin's. He loves her, but not like that, not anymore. 
Liked how Bay was all relaxed and smiley coming onto the bridge, too. A fortuitously-timed kiss can make all the difference, apparently!
