Part VI: Last Grasp
1
“I’m reading significant Outlander activity ahead,” said DeMara Deen from her station at operations. “As we suspected, there is no way for us to sneak into Cygni-98 undetected. There are listening posts crisscrossing a vast area of this part of space. We get any closer with a ship the size of
Eagle and we’ll trigger sensor alerts across half the sector.”
Tazla Star stood from the command chair that had become increasingly uncomfortable to the point where she was beginning to doubt that she ever wanted one of her own ever again, even if they survived this and somehow found their way back home. And even if Starfleet Command suddenly had a change of heart about allowing an officer with her sordid history back into the exclusive club of starship captains. “Drop us out warp here.”
Lif Culsten, back at the helm in what felt like forever, acknowledged promptly and the streaking starfield on the viewscreen gave way to one that appeared decidedly more static.
Tazla headed for the back of the bridge where she found Xylion and Garla sitting at the two aft science stations. She suppressed the urge to pull her away from the workstation as the notion of letting a foreign intelligence officer have free access to their systems went against every fiber of her being, not to mention half a dozen Starfleet regulations. The fact that it was this particular intelligence officer, one who had been a major thorn in her side from the first time she had encountered her, made it harder to ignore her instincts. And yet she found a way. “Any ideas yet on how you can get in touch with the local Krellonian rebels?”
Garla nodded without taking her eyes off the screens, Tazla could tell that there was a little smile tugging at her lips. “Very much so,” she said.
This seemed to be news to the science officer sitting next to her, judging by the way one of his eyebrows climbed toward the ceiling.
Tazla glanced over her shoulder to get a better look at what she was studying and it annoyed her that she couldn’t really make much sense of any of it. “That looks like cosmic background radiation.”
Garla turned around to face her. “Oh, it’s much more that, Commander. These are FRBs. Surely you learned about this in whatever passes for spy school at Starfleet Academy.”
She glared at the other woman. “Even if I had attended some sort of spy school, the curriculum would have focused on spying, not astronomy.”
“What a shame, considering the intrinsic value of having a strong understanding of both.”
Tazla decided she had no time for Garla’s games. “Why don’t you enlighten those of us who have not enjoyed your level of sophisticated education?”
Her smile widened again. “Fast radio bursts. There are large quantities of these within the sector, partially due to the high concentration of stellar clusters within Amargosa.”
She glanced at Xylion, still not fully understanding the relevance. The Vulcan was quick to explain. “Fast radio bursts are high-energy radio emissions commonly emitted by magnetars that can travel vast intergalactic distances.”
“Except, not always,” said Garla. “Some are artificially created. The Eye of Krellon uses fast radio bursts to send communiqués disguised as random cosmic radiation,” she said and pointed at the screen. “And those artificial bursts tend to be in a fluency range of three point five to three point eight millijansky.”
Xylion considered her screen. “There appears to be a high number of FRBs in this sector within that range,” he said and then glanced at Tazla. “It is conceivable that those bursts are being used as a way to facilitate communications.”
Garla stood. “I’m willing to bet that that’s exactly how the rebels coordinate. In plain sight and without the Outlanders having any notion whatsoever.”
Tazla nodded. “Okay. And you can contact the rebels using these radio bursts?”
“I’m certain of it,” she said and began to approach the tactical horseshoe where So’Dan Leva was standing watch. But the tall, half-Romulan officer refused to budge, instead, he defiantly crossed his arms in front of his chest. “All I need is access to your comms.”
Leva shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
The sentinel turned back and found Xylion instead. “Commander, how much time do you estimate we have until the collider powers back up and potentially wipes out all of existence.”
“If our calculations are correct, four hours and twenty-six minutes,” he said without even having to consult a computer.
Garla shot Tazla an insistent look. “Not a lot of time. Do you want to waste it on me explaining to your people how to communicate via FRBs?”
Tazla didn’t respond. Instead, she just directed a nod at the tactical officer.
Leva didn’t look pleased but complied. But not before he entered a few commands into his board. “Go ahead. But I locked out the tactical systems.”
“A wise precaution, I’m sure,” she said and then quickly stepped up next to Leva and began working on the board. It didn’t take her long at all to familiarize herself with the console’s layout.
“There are about twenty-four micro transmissions that fall into the right fluency range. The majority will be nothing but random noise to disguise the real ones. The trick is to rule out the fake ones and piggyback on the genuine article before anyone realizes what I’m looking at,” she said even as her fingers danced over the workstation. “Here we go.”
The main viewscreen shifted to show a heavily distorted image, impossible to make out.
“You found a rebel comm channel?” Tazla said.
She nodded. “Just need to clean it up a bit and—“
“Who is this?”
The voice boomed across the bridge before the image had a chance to stabilize.
Garla looked up. “A friend sympathetic to your cause.”
“How did you get access to this channel?”
“Let’s just say that I’m no stranger to creative solutions to difficult problems.”
“I’m closing this channel and I suggest you never attempt to access it again.”
Tazla could see that Lif Culsten had turned in his chair and was now looking right at Garla at tactical. His eyes seemed to mirror recognition. Garla responded in kind and began to nod. “Just give me one minute to hear me out.”
“And why would I do something as stupid as that?”
“Do it for an old friend,” she added. “Yorlo.”
The name sounded familiar to Tazla but she couldn’t immediately place it.
“Who is this?” the voice demanded more forcefully.
“Has it really been that long?”
The image finally cleared and Tazla recognized the larger-than-life face that appeared on the screen, even though he had not sported the thick white beard the last time she had met that person. That had been when they had first arrived at Piqus VII. It belonged to the same man who had apparently pulled the strings to get
Eagle into Krellonian space under the pretense of assisting with a pandemic that had broken out on the planet. In reality, Councilman Yorlo, a prominent Krellonian politician had sought to bring Lif Culsten back into the Star Alliance so that he could try and spy on Garla, his estranged wife.
Whatever their relationship was in this universe, it didn’t appear much better, judging by the hard look in his eyes when he recognized who had contacted him.
“I thought you were dead.”
“Not just yet.”
He uttered a humorless laugh.
“I’m not even pretending to be surprised by this news. The great Garla, faking her own death to shirk her responsibility of leading a failed cause. I should have seen that coming. I hope you’re proud of yourself.”
She shook her head. “That’s not exactly how this story goes.”
“Oh please, spare us all the self-righteous explanations. I’ve heard it all before. The only thing Garla has ever cared about is Garla. No matter if it means thrusting a child into a role he was never prepared for. Liftu’s death is on your hands, I hope you can live with that.”
Tazla could see that Lif was considering speaking up and perhaps making his presence known but Garla waved him off, clearly not believing that his presence would improve the outcome of this conversation.
She placed her hands on the tactical board and leaned forward slightly. “Listen to me, Yorlo. I am not the Garla you think you know. But we don’t have the time to cover the basics of advanced quantum mechanics. The resistance needs to make a move and it needs to make a move now. And not just for the Krellonian cause but for the fate of entire universes. Thanks to the Borg, the Outlander forces are in disarray. This is time to strike.”
Tazla recognized the look on Yorlo’s face and it didn’t fill her encouragement.
“You’ve forfeited the right to decide anybody’s fate but your own when you abandoned us. I suggest you leave this sector and never come back. If you decide to ignore my friendly advice, and we ever cross paths again, I’ll make damn sure that the next time you die, it’ll be permanent. I’ll grant you a quick death. For old time’s sake.”
The connection ended abruptly.
“That didn’t go well,” Deen said.
“To say the least,” added Tazla.
But Garla was quiet for a moment, seemingly pondering her conversation with Yorlo. Then she turned to look Tazla straight in the eye. “I’m going to need a shuttle.”
“What?” Lif said and stood from his chair. “To do what, exactly?”
“While we were speaking, I managed to triangulate Yorlo’s position. He isn’t far. But bringing a crowd would be too difficult to explain. I need to face him alone.”
“You heard the man,” said Lif. “He’s furious with you. Far more so than the Uncle Yorlo I know. He’ll blast you out of space the moment he sees you coming.”
“I tend to agree,” said Tazla. “That did not sound like a man willing to reconcile.”
The sentinel offered her a little smile. “I take it, Commander, that you’ve never been married.”
“I have sufficient experience in that field,” she said, referring to her symbiont’s history. “I’m familiar with both the blissful highs and the dastardly lows. That conversation was evidence of the latter.”
“A lot of this is bluster and yes, anger, but I’m familiar with it and I can work with both.”
Culsten took a few steps closer, shaking his head. “You don’t even know that man. You don’t even know if this Garla was married to him.”
“It is obvious that there is history there and trust me, I’ve had these kinds of arguments with Yorlo. More than I care to remember. I know which buttons to push with him, all I need is a chance to speak to him face to face,” she said, although her words were doing little, it seemed, to convince her nephew. She considered Tazla instead. “Commander, we don’t have much time. Let me do this. At worst you lose a shuttlecraft, at best we save quantum reality. What other choice do we have?”
Most of all, Tazla hated the fact that Garla’s argument was perfectly sound. She nodded. “Main shuttlebay, go. I think you know the way.”
Garla responded with a nod of her own and made a beeline for the turbolift.
Culsten intercepted her just as she boarded it. “This is suicide,” he said.
“Have a little faith.”
“I ran out of that a while ago.”
Already in the lift, Garla took a step forward again to block the doors from closing. “Listen to me. I want you to remember something. No matter what you’ve told yourself over the years, the Star Alliance is still your home and you may make it back there without me.”
He shook his head. “Don’t even—“
“Contrary to some other versions of me we have met, I don’t do speeches. But there is no doubt that I’ve made a lot of mistakes.”
“And what do you expect me to do?”
She placed a hand on his shoulder. “Better. It shouldn’t be that difficult,” she said, offered a little smile, and then stepped back to allow the doors to swish close.
