Catalyst

  When the tour finally ended, they were ushered to an ornately decorated banqueting room where somehow, given only nine hours since their initial contact, the Halaamans had put together an enormous party. The team was seated at the head table with the Great Leader and several dignitaries of both genders, all bald and tattooed, and all of whom deflected every one of Ekatya’s attempts to find out more about the Guild. There was always another dance performance to watch, a food item to be described and tasted, a singer to listen to, or something else to be discussed. Never in her life had she been so politely and consistently repelled.

  When she finally dropped all pretense at subtlety and asked to discuss what she had come for, the Great Leader said in loud and jovial tones, “There is plenty of time for business tomorrow! Tonight is for pleasure, for celebration! How often do we meet another peaceful and courteous race? We must savor this moment!”

  All of the dignitaries at the table gave a shout of approval and began talking over each other about past celebrations.

  Ekatya gave up.

  She tried again when the guests were herded to the opulent library for after-dinner drinks and informal conversation, but had no better luck. Expertise at avoidance was apparently a Halaaman trait.

  The event concluded with a thousand wordy farewells, after which a squad of palace guards arrived to escort the team to their lodgings. There was no question of deviating from their path; the guards were expressionless and armed with weapons holstered at their hips. Where the banquet attendees had exuded nothing but conviviality, the guards gave off an air of professional menace.

  Their lodgings consisted of three suites high up in a distant wing of the palace. Ekatya had a suite to herself, as befitting a leader. Her six security escorts were given another, while her anthropologist and two data systems analysts were given a third. Most of the palace guards retreated once they were settled, but one remained posted outside each suite door—for their own security, they were told—and Ekatya had noted two more staying behind in the junction room at the end of their corridor.

  She wasted no time gathering her team into the living area of her suite. Lieutenant Kitt, the analyst chosen by Commander Kenji, pulled a tiny jammer from her chest pocket and set it on a decorative table in the center of the room. Checking its readings on her pad, she announced, “There are three listening devices and one video logger transmitting from this suite. Or were. They’re not hearing or seeing anything now.”

  “So much for our trusting hosts. You’ve limited the jammer range?”

  “Yes, the guards outside still have their radios. There are video loggers in the hall, too. No surprise there.”

  Ekatya looked around the group. “I’ve just spent four hours eating more than I wanted to and learning absolutely nothing. Did anyone else have better luck?”

  Nine heads shook a simultaneous no. She was surprised it didn’t create a breeze.

  “The food was great,” Trooper Torado offered. He reminded her of Colonel Micah, with his intimidating size and bristling haircut.

  Warrant Officer Roris elbowed him. “Not helpful, Torado.”

  Ekatya smiled at their easy camaraderie and wondered, not for the first time, whether she might do Roris a disservice by recommending her for field officer training. She had such a tight-knit weapons team with Troopers Torado, Ennserhofen, and Blunt. They had stuck together through thick and thin and were now on their third ship assignment together. If Roris became a commissioned officer, she would lose this.

  “The food was good,” she agreed. “But that’s not what I’m looking for.” Ignoring the second elbow shot Roris sent to Torado, she turned to the youngest member of their group. “Ensign Bellows, you’re more accustomed than most to boring diplomatic affairs. What did you think?”

  Put on the spot, Bellows grew even more owl-eyed than normal. He swallowed and said, “I think they worked pretty hard at saying nothing.”

  And that was why she liked him. He had summed up that entire banquet in one sentence.

  “I agree,” she said. “I asked six ways forward and twelve backward and always got the same non-answer. And given that these people just met advanced aliens for apparently for the second time in their history, they had surprisingly few questions.”

  “Yes, what was that about?” Roris asked. “I noticed that, too. They didn’t ask us anything. They just wanted to talk about themselves and their art and music and Seeders know what else. That was the worst date I’ve ever been on.”

  Torado and Ennserhofen snorted with laughter, and even shy Trooper Blunt smiled. The two security officers, who had been paragons of professional behavior throughout, kept straight faces.

  Lieutenant Gizobasan, the team’s anthropologist, caught Ekatya’s eye. “The reports led me to believe these people would be far more curious. And even barring that, their culture is built around equal treatment and courtesy. The way they treated us looked courteous on the surface, but by their own standards, it wasn’t. True courtesy would have meant asking us about ourselves and our culture.”

  “So what are we saying here?” Roris asked. “Besides the fact that they’re hiding something and they don’t want to ask us questions because then we might expect answers from them?”

  “They’re stalling,” Ekatya said.

  Gizobasan nodded. “That makes sense. They’re putting us off while they ask the Guild about us.”

  “And we’ll get no answers until they hear back. Which means the answers we do get will be dictated by the Guild. It also means we could be waiting a long time; they use light-speed communication. So unless the Guild has a ship within a few light-hours…” Ekatya loosened the throat guard of her dress uniform jacket. “Does anyone think there’s a remote chance the Guild could be the Voloth?”

  One of the security officers shook his head silently; the other shrugged. “Seems unlikely, Captain,” he said.

  One by one, every member of the team added their agreement.

  Ekatya sighed. It just figured this would turn out to be complicated. “Protectorate Security wants this resolved as quickly as possible. I already reported my suspicions that the Voloth haven’t been here, but now they’re concerned about a new player in galactic politics. We’re ordered to find out who the Guild are, and asking nicely didn’t work. Looking at it from the Great Leader’s point of view, he’s made some sort of deal that benefits him so tremendously that he’s ignoring the presence of a warship and what we might be able to offer until he can hear from his trade partners.”

  “Oh, I see where you’re going with this.” Bellows was exuding the air of excitement he had so often shared with her in the Presidential Palace, when the two of them were the only people they could trust. “Whatever this Guild is, they can’t have a ship the size of the Phoenix or we’d have heard of them before now. So they must be offering something that offsets our potential, and that means technology.”

  Roris crossed her arms over her chest. “Or weapons.”

  Trust a weapons specialist to think of that. “You’re right. We have to consider both. Either one would upset the balance of power in this system, not to mention giving capabilities to this planet that the Protectorate might not be happy to see. So…” She turned to Kitt and Bellows, who was practically bouncing in place. “This is where you two come in. We need to get into their communication systems.”

  “I don’t think we can do that from here, Captain.” Kitt indicated the com panel on the far side of the room. “I could take that apart and do my best, but we already know this room has been tapped, so my guess is the com panel is, too. Even if it weren’t, this is an outlying unit. I’d need to know their programming language to make it work for me.”

  Bellows nodded. “We have to do what we planned.”

  “I was afraid of that.” Ekatya looked at Lieutenant Korelonn, her lead security officer. “How did the mapping efforts go during ou
r tour?”

  He pulled his pad from its sleeve pocket. “We know where not to go.”

  “That’s for sure,” Torado muttered.

  Korelonn cracked a slight smile, which did little to lighten his overall demeanor. He had a similar build to Torado, but where Torado was open and sociable, Korelonn seemed to view the world in a constant state of suspicion. His square jaw was already darkened with beard growth, though he had been smooth-shaven when they first boarded the shuttle.

  “We did map a hot spot behind that last art gallery on the sixth floor,” he said. “It was too far from the banquet hall to be the kitchen and not hot enough to be their temperature regulation equipment. The radio activity was strong in that area as well. I think that’s our best bet for their communication core.”

  “I trust your best bet. All right, everyone, we follow the plan as discussed. Lieutenant Kitt, Ensign Bellows, get your gear ready. Everyone else, assemble your weapons. We’ll wait here until sixteen hundred hours ship time.” In local time, that would be the middle of the night.

  Kitt and Bellows immediately took off their jackets, sat on the nearest chairs, and began pulling tools and bits of equipment from their jacket linings. The others found places to sit as well, and were soon immersed in assembling their weapons.

  Ekatya stepped away from the group, activated her internal com, and brought Commander Lokomorra up to date.

  “Not what we hoped,” he said.

  “I know. But we can’t wait until tomorrow. There’s no guarantee that tomorrow will give us answers either, and we can’t keep our fighter pilots in their cockpits that long.”

  “Well, we could, but they’d be so paralyzed by the morning that they wouldn’t be able to fly. They were sorry to have missed the banquet, by the way.”

  “Tell them they missed about four hours of nothing. I wouldn’t mind sending them back except that I have a bad feeling about whatever it is that this Guild has sold to our hosts, and I’m not sure we could negotiate passage for our fighters down here a second time. Get the Phoenix ready for a hot pickup, Commander. I’ll call when it’s time.”

  She sat down on the last available chair and removed the false heels from her boots. The two halves snapped together into a pistol grip, which she then loaded with both types of nonlethal ammunition secreted in her uniform jacket lining. One was a shock charge, the other a tiny, instant-acting sedative dart. The grip held enough for twenty shots of each.

  She pulled two barrels from another part of her jacket lining, screwed them in place, and attached the front stabilizer and sight. After slipping the flat holster out of one of her pockets, she locked the latch into position, clipped it to the back of her belt, and slid the pistol inside. Finally, she unzipped two inside pouches and scooped out the stun beads, putting them into her side jacket pockets for easy access.

  Between her and the rest of the landing team, they were equipped to take out half the guards in this palace. Nor were they defenseless against the probably lethal weapons those guards were carrying: the flexible armor in their uniform jackets would stop most projectiles and dissipate all but the strongest of phaser charges. Not for the first time, Ekatya was grateful for cautious Fleet uniform designers who insisted that “dress” should not mean “sitting target.”

  Now came the hardest part: waiting. They sat around in an uncomfortable silence, until Ekatya asked Roris to tell the story of their memorable shore leave at Erebderis Station. She complied with enthusiasm and the willing assistance of her teammates, all of whom had been involved. The tale drew the group together in laughter, even the always-serious Korelonn. Then Roris mentioned Ekatya’s fight with Lancer Tal, a teaser that had everyone looking expectant. With a martyred sigh and a concession that it was only fair she should tell a story too, Ekatya launched into an abbreviated version of her challenge.

  “By the time I yielded, I hardly remembered my own name,” she finished. “And it was only later that I found out she went easy on me. Don’t ever get in a fight with an Alsean warrior.”

  “It wasn’t that she fought an Alsean warrior,” Roris put in. “It was that she picked a fight with the leader of the entire warrior caste. Our captain sets her sights high.”

  “You never told me that,” Bellows said. “I was your assistant for sixteen months and I’m only now hearing this?”

  “It’s not something I’m going to sing about in the Presidential Palace.”

  “Well…yes, of course, but still! You got in a fight with the Lancer of Alsea! That’s so…”

  “Stupid?” Ekatya suggested.

  “No, amazing! I hope Dr. Rivers put that in her book.”

  “Not if she values our relationship, she didn’t.”

  She listened to their laughter and remembered those first days on Alsea, when she had worked so hard to hide her ties with Lhyn. That was a part of her life she didn’t miss at all.

  “Now, see, if I were going to pick a fight with an Alsean warrior, I’d have picked Lead Guard Gehrain,” Roris said.

  Torado looked at her askance. “Is there rot in your brain? He was bigger than me! And they have much denser muscle mass. That man carried me out of our weapons room. He would have crushed your ass into the dirt.” Too late, he remembered where he was. “Sorry, Captain.”

  She waved a hand. “I think we can consider ourselves off the record. Besides, I want to hear why Roris would have fought Gehrain.”

  “Because if I’m going to get my ass crushed into the dirt, I’d want to look up and see him.” Roris made a fanning motion by her face. “Once you got over the facial ridges, he was a fine specimen.”

  Shy Trooper Blunt, who until now had not said one word that Ekatya had heard, now spoke up clearly. “Yes, he was. And he preferred men.”

  “Oho!” Torado whooped and held up his hand. With a smile, Blunt punched her small fist into his palm. Torado then turned and punched Roris in the shoulder. “From Blunt to you, ouch!”

  Ekatya settled back and listened as her weapons team entertained the group with tales of Alsea. They had two hours to kill, and she couldn’t think of a more enjoyable way to do it.

  CHAPTER 29:

  Unexpected ties

  When they had planned their raid back on the Phoenix, Ekatya’s first thought had been to blow out any Halaaman surveillance equipment with an electromagnetic pulse. Kitt and Korelonn had suggested that a better strategy would be to temporarily jam the equipment in the area they were moving through. As Korelonn pointed out, if they wanted to move in a covert fashion, leaving a trail of permanently disabled equipment was not the way to go about it.

  “Lieutenant Kitt, you have the second jammer ready?” Ekatya asked.

  Kitt patted the chest pocket of her dress jacket. “Right here, ready to blind and deafen everything around us.”

  “Good. I’ll see all of you out and wait until you get to your doors. My guard shouldn’t find that unusual. Then I’ll take out mine while you—”

  “Oh, no,” Korelonn said. “With respect, Captain, your safety is my responsibility. I’ll stay here with you and take out your guard.”

  She decided it wasn’t worth the argument. “Very well. Who is doing the others?”

  They concluded that since Torado was the largest of the remaining five in their suite, while Kitt was the tallest in her group, they would take the jobs.

  “But I’ll need help catching mine,” Kitt said. “That man is big. Bellows, stay close to me.”

  “I will.”

  “Drag them here when you’re done,” Ekatya said. “An empty hall will attract less notice than one full of sleeping guards. I’m just sorry all the guards have shaved heads. I was hoping we could use their uniforms.”

  “I’ll do a lot for a mission,” said Roris, running a hand through her short brown locks. “But I’d have to be desperate to do that.”

  “You and me b
oth.” Blunt gave her white ponytail a tug.

  The chuckles told Ekatya that despite gearing up for their operation, this group was still relaxed. That boded well for their teamwork.

  They all made one last check of their weapons, and Ekatya called Commander Lokomorra to tell him they were on the move. He would alert the shuttle and fighter pilots, who would prepare for an evacuation.

  When they had all gathered at the door, Ekatya opened it and stood at the side opposite her guard. He glanced at her with a faint look of surprise before returning his gaze to the opposite wall.

  “Well done, everyone,” Ekatya said in a normal tone. “Try to get some sleep in what’s left of the night.”

  They filed out with a chorus of goodnights, and she stood slightly back to give Korelonn room. When both groups had arrived at their doors, she held up a finger toward Korelonn and called out, “Oh, I forgot something. Lieutenant Kitt, Trooper Torado…go.”

  She dropped her finger as she spoke, and the hall turned into a flurry of silent activity. Korelonn leaned around the door frame and shot Ekatya’s guard with a sedative dart, then stepped out and caught him under the armpits as he toppled forward. She moved out of the way, giving him space to drag the guard back into the room. The others were already coming toward her, Torado hefting his guard over his shoulders while Kitt and Bellows were hauling theirs by his arms and legs. Within one minute they had all three guards lined up on the floor of the suite, where the first jammer would keep them hidden until someone made a physical check of the room.

  With this act, they had gone from diplomacy to armed incursion. They could not leave the Halaamans with their weapons.