She nodded. “Anything is possible.”
“But…the way it was done! How could they possibly think that you’d have just…just torn him up like that? That you could?”
“It doesn’t seem reasonable, does it.”
“No! Why, given opportunity and motive, it only makes sense that I would have—”
She stopped and stared at Mueller, and her eyes narrowed. Her nostrils began to twitch. “Ohhhh…I get it.”
“Get it?” Mueller stared at her levelly. “M’Ress, you seem tense.”
“How can you tell?”
“Your ears are down and your tail is straight back.”
“Are they?” M’Ress’s laugh was brittle. “Well, that’s a surprise. Then again, none of it should be a surprise, should it. I should have realized you were no different than they are. No different!” Her voice carried, and now no one in the Ten-Forward was making the slightest pretense of looking the other way. “You weren’t trying to be nice to me! You weren’t taking my side! You were trying to trick me into confessing!”
“Do you have something to confess to?” Mueller asked. Any trace of inebriation was gone from her face, if there’d ever been any there at all.
“Oh, you’d like that, wouldn’t you. It’d make your job so nice and simple. The outsider, the Starfleet officer from years ago, brought her hundred-year-old hands-on sense of justice to the modern era. Well, forget it, Commander!”
“Lieutenant, sit down,” said Mueller, sounding a bit tired. “You’re getting the wrong idea….”
“No, I think I’ve got exactly the right idea! You’re sniffing around, investigating…”
“Nothing has to be sniffed around,” Mueller told her, and she got to her feet. “Doc Villers is doing a thorough forensics sweep of the turbolift and Gleau’s body. It’s taking a little while to sort out because the lift is so heavily trafficked an area. But once that’s done, we’ll know. And that will be that.”
“And you were figuring…what?” she demanded with a slight toss of her mane. “That if the evidence proved conclusively it was me, you were going to try and make it easier on me? Perhaps get me to confess so it would look better in the final report? If I show some remorse, it might take a few years off my sentence?”
“Something like that,” admitted Mueller.
“Well, forget it!” M’Ress started circling the Ten-Forward, moving like a great stalking feline, and she felt some inner degree of pleasure that the others were flinching back from her. All except Janos, whose infinitely sad gaze followed her around the room. “Because if any of you are expecting me to shed one tear over him, you can forget it! He made my life a living hell. And I couldn’t be happier that he’s dead! And I can see what’s going through all your minds. You’re thinking, ‘How can she say that? Doesn’t she know how guilty that makes her sound?’”
“I have to admit, it did occur to me,” Janos spoke up.
“Oh? Then how about this: Only someone with a completely clear conscience would dare express happiness that someone who was a danger to her isn’t around to pose it anymore. And that’s me! Clear conscience up and down the line.” She turned back to face Mueller, pivoting noiselessly on her padded feet. “You want ‘sorry,’ Commander? Here’s your ‘sorry’: I’m sorry I didn’t put the bastard down myself. I’d never, ever have done it, because I’m a decent and ethical being. But inside me, Commander,” and she leaned forward, balancing on the edge of the table, “inside me there’s a primal, feral part that would have delighted in feeling his blood pumping out of an artery severed by my own hand. Delighted in it. And if in this century, thinking about something is the same as actually doing it, then send in security to cart me away!”
At that moment, the door to the Ten-Forward opened. M’Ress caught the familiar scent of Arex before he even came through the door. Three security guards were with him, and all of them had their phasers out. Clearly they were expecting some sort of struggle.
There were captains on either side of them: Shelby on the left, Calhoun on the right. In both cases, their faces were grim. M’Ress suspected that Calhoun in particular was upset; the scar on his face was standing out bright crimson against his skin. They did not have weapons drawn. Obviously they were confident the security team was packing enough firepower.
Pushed to extremes and beyond, M’Ress didn’t hesitate. With a snarl, she vaulted across the room, dropping right in front of the security squad. Arex looked slightly taken aback and stared at her questioningly.
“So how are we going to do this, Arex?” she demanded. “Going to drag me into a small room? Going to keep me from having food and water for hour after hour until I tell you what you want to hear, whether it’s true or not?”
His eyes widened. “Shib, what the hell are you talking about?”
She was taken aback by his obvious confusion.
“Lieutenant,” said Shelby, taking a step forward, a hardness in her eyes that would brook no further interference. “I know you’ve been under a strain lately, and that’s being taken into account. But I’m giving you a direct order to stand aside immediately.”
“Stand…aside?” She didn’t comprehend, and yet automatically she moved to the side of the security squad. It was then she realized they were looking right past her.
“Ensign Janos, will you come with us, please?” said Shelby.
M’Ress felt a cold chill down her spine as she turned and saw Janos rise. The way in which he did it, the slow uncoiling, helped underscore just how fast and deadly he could be when he put his mind to it. But he did not seem troubled in his manner; just mildly perplexed. “Is there a problem?”
“Janos,” said Calhoun, and there was tension in his voice. “Don’t make this more difficult than it need be.”
“I’m not quite sure what the required difficulty level might be, since the issue at hand has not been properly illuminated,” Janos said. “Would someone be so kind as to enlighten me?”
“You want to be formal?” asked Shelby. “Very well: We can be formal. Ensign Janos, you are under arrest for the murder of Lieutenant Commander Gleau, and direct contravention of Regulation Thirty-eight, Sections One through Four.”
There was dead silence in the Ten-Forward for a moment. M’Ress felt the hackles rising on the back of her neck. Janos, for his part, appeared unperturbed. “You know, if they felt the need to make a specific regulation against murdering officers, you’d think they’d have given it a bit more priority than placing it at number thirty-eight.”
“Ensign, this is hardly a joking matter,” said Calhoun.
“With all respect, sir, to me it is. It has to be a joke. I was not responsible for Gleau’s death.”
“The evidence indicates differently, Ensign. You are now being ordered to accompany us to the brig, pursuant to further investigation.”
Another silence, this one even longer.
“Very well,” said Janos quietly. He seemed more resentful than anything else. “Let us attend to this immediately so we can clear up this misunderstanding as briskly as possible. Gentlemen…ladies…” and he bowed deeply, like a magician about to disappear off the stage after having put on an incredibly good show. He turned back to the security team. “Would you care for me to walk around so that I’m in front of you? I mean, you could keep your weapons aimed at me and then walk backward the whole way. Or we can make this easy on you. Your discretion.”
Calhoun gestured for Janos to precede them. “After you,” he said.
“Thank you, Captain.” With his head held high, Janos swayed slightly from side to side as he moved in his standard anthropoid gait.
“As you were,” Shelby called out to the rest of Ten-Forward. “XO, if it wouldn’t be too much of a problem…”
“On my way to take the conn, Captain,” Mueller said immediately.
“Thank you, XO,” said Shelby.
Mueller turned quickly to M’Ress and paused long enough to say, “We’ll chat more later.” Then she
was out the door after Shelby.
The moment they were gone, hushed conversation filled the air of the Ten-Forward. They were all looking toward the door, as if expecting Janos to come back through there at any time. All interest in speculating about M’Ress, silently or otherwise, had abruptly ended.
She had never felt so relieved, and so simultaneously distraught, in her life.
Then
i.
Joshua Kemper was a tall, good-looking, square-jawed example of Starfleet, with broad shoulders and closely cropped black hair.
He stood leaning against the entrance to the main building of Starfleet Academy, shielding his eyes against the sun as he looked up and watched the shuttles arriving in a steady stream, each carrying with it a new crop of Starfleet recruits. The brisk salt air of San Francisco Bay wafted toward him on the stiff breeze. He inhaled deeply, finding the scent exhilarating.
“Bringing back memories?”
He glanced over to see his best friend, Ray Williams, approaching. Williams bore a resemblance to Kemper, but he was taller and his face was more open; he always looked on the brink of laughing at a joke. Kemper chuckled when he saw him and reached over, patting Williams on the stomach. “Let yourself go during the summer, Ray.”
“Nonsense. My mother’s cooking would do this to anyone,” he replied, thumping his gut. “I’ll have it worked off within two weeks, Kemp. Mark me.” He saw where Kemper was looking and shook his head. “The new arrivals. How they looking?”
“More raw every year,” said Kemper.
“Were we ever that young and stupid-looking?” Williams wondered.
Kemper firmly shook his head. “Never.”
“Good, I thought as much.”
As the students arrived, they would head one by one or in groups toward an orientation center, guided there by various senior students who had been given the specific duty or, in some cases, had even volunteered. To Kemper, volunteering for such a thing seemed a waste of material and possibilities.
More shuttles were arriving, and Kemper felt stirred to action. “Come on, Ray. Too gorgeous a day to let opportunities slip past us.”
“Awww, Kemp,” moaned Williams. “Why try to start up trouble, huh?”
“Because it lets the plebes know just exactly where they stand and where we stand.” He clapped Williams on the back and spoke expansively, like a Roman senator putting forward declarations for an attentive senate, striding toward the arrival pads as he spoke. “It’s not truly up to us, Ray. Our actions in this matter are dictated by time-honored tradition. We are not endeavoring to ‘start up’ anything. We are merely carrying on in the long—”
“If I come along, will you shut up?” said Williams.
“Of course!”
“Because God forbid you could just do this for your own amusement. You need an audience, and I’m elected.”
“You could participate…”
“Ohhh, this is much more your thing than mine. But I’ll cheer you on, because that’s what friends are for.”
“You are an officer and a gentleman,” said Kemper approvingly.
A new shuttle, this one just arrived from the switching station on Titan, disgorged more passengers, just as Kemper and Williams drew close. The cadets were standing there, clutching their bags, looking variously excited, nervous, confident, scared. There were half a dozen of them…
No. Half a dozen plus one more.
Williams saw him at the same time. “Ohhh, he seems ripe.”
“Your excellent eye for talent has not diminished,” said Kemper approvingly.
The “one more” was standing several feet from the others, who were clustered together and talking excitedly among themselves. He was just standing there, staring at the buildings surrounding Academy Plaza as if he’d never seen anything like them. He very likely hadn’t.
“Would you like to know his story?” Kemper asked.
“You know his story?”
“Of course,” said Kemper, tapping the side of his head. “My practiced eye misses nothing. The likelihood is that he was raised on some small farming colony somewhere, possibly in one of the outer systems. He took the entrance exam, tested well—possibly he cheated or had an old family friend administering it who was willing to look the other way…you know the type…and then his parents pulled together the where-withal to send him here so he could aspire to some sort of better life than they have.”
“You can tell all that,” said Williams skeptically, “just by looking at him.”
“Absolutely.” He smiled in anticipation. “I’ll bet you he’s never even seen a Starfleet officer. Probably worships the mere notion of us, like gods.”
“I see someone became full of himself during the summer.”
“Better that than full of Mom’s home cooking,” Kemper chided him. “Come on. Let’s do our duty.”
Kemper and Williams picked up the pace and arrived at the group of cadets at exactly the same time as another upperclassman. She was holding a padd and was clearly one of those guiding the plebes to where they were supposed to be. Her name was Theresa Detwiler, and Kemper had seen her socially for a while before the relationship self-destructed, as so many tended to do during the crucible of Academy life. Detwiler saw him coming, and she ran her fingers through her lengthy red hair in that way she did when she anticipated problems.
The cadets saw Kemper and Williams coming as well, and unconsciously—or perhaps deliberately, in some cases—they straightened up. Kemper could well understand why. He and Ray certainly cut impressive figures in their sharp fourth-year uniforms. We are as gods, he thought again, and took amused pleasure from that.
Only the bumpkin from the farming colony didn’t snap to. He didn’t even appear to notice the upperclassmen. He was still too busy staring at the buildings.
“Welcome, Cadets,” Detwiler was saying, although Kemper could see that her peripheral vision was fixed on him. “I’m Theresa Detwiler, a third-year cadet, and I’m your orientation guide here at…”
“I’ll take it from here, Terry,” Kemper said confidently, striding forward, arms draped behind his back.
“I believe, Mr. Kemper, I have matters in hand,” said Detwiler.
He smiled pleasantly. “I’m sure you do. But, fourth-year prerogative…I thought I’d see the kind of stuff that’s being sent to the Academy these days. You!” he said abruptly, his entire tone changing. “With the scar. Eyes front.”
Closer up, Kemper had a better chance to study the young man who had caught his attention. His clothes were extremely plain and seemed thrown together with little concept of fashion sense. His hair was trimmed but hung about his face carelessly, as if he’d had it cut and styled recently, but couldn’t be bothered to worry about maintaining it. His eyes were…
Kemper froze.
It wasn’t the color of the eyes that caused him to be taken aback. Purple was unusual, granted, but not so unusual that it would disturb a fourth-year cadet. No, it was the coldness that he saw in them. Eyes that were sizing him up, burning with chill fire, looking to see…
Looking to see the best way to kill him.
Yes. That was it. Pure, undiluted savagery that was assessing in a heartbeat whether this man was an enemy and, if so, what would be the most efficient way of dispatching him.
And then, just like that, the farmboy (for so Kemper had dubbed him) pulled a virtual veil across his eyes. Only for an instant had Kemper seen the undiluted ferocity of what was facing him, and then it was gone…so quickly, in fact, that Kemper barely had time to process what he’d seen. It didn’t fully register on him. And because of that, Kemper was able to convince himself that whatever he’d thought he’d spotted in that deadly gaze was merely his imagination. He’d been away from the Academy for too long. The summer break had made him rusty, that’s all there was to it. Rusty and second-guessing himself.
“What’s your name, scar face?” demanded Kemper, squaring his shoulders to look even more impressive t
han he already was.
The boy stared impassively at him. Whatever emotions he felt over the comment on his scar were kept tightly wrapped. Kemper couldn’t help but approve. A Starfleet officer needed self-control, and this young man obviously had it in spades. But this was hardly the time or situation to start bandying about compliments.
“Your name,” he said again when the boy didn’t answer.
When the boy finally replied, Kemper blinked. It didn’t sound like a name. It sounded as if the boy were gargling. There was a “Mah” sound in there, followed by what seemed to be random consonants slapped together. “What the hell kind of name is that?” he demanded.
“Mr. Kemper,” said Detwiler sharply, “I really must insist…”
“Xenexian,” the boy said, speaking over Detwiler.
“Xenexian.” He tried to recall what he knew about Xenexians. Not much. So the boy wasn’t a farmer; instead he was from some backwater planet that was barely up to Federation standards. Perhaps he was someone’s idea of a charity case. He certainly didn’t seem particularly impressive or imposing. Slowly Kemper started to walk back and forth with a slight swagger. He cast a glance at Williams, mutely seeking approval, but Williams was just watching scar face as if he was concerned something was going to go horribly wrong. Well, that was typical Williams: always worrying about nothing. “I hear,” continued Kemper, “that only two things ever come out of Xenex: fools and mules. You don’t look like a mule, so you must be a fool. Is that right?”
“Josh, for crying out loud—!” said Detwiler.
He silenced her with a look. His seniority over her was marginal at best, but it was still there, and Detwiler understood and respected the chain of command as well as anyone. She smoldered but fell silent.
“Well? Which is it?” demanded Kemper.
Scar face said nothing. Just stared at him.
Kemper stepped in closer to him. “Are you giving me eye, boy? You don’t give me eye! You respect your senior officers, one of whom happens to be me.”