Rise of the Federation: Live by the Code Read online

  Phlox declined to point out that Antaak’s metagenic viral research had been conducted under orders from the High Council. If anyone was ultimately responsible for the Qu’Vat mutation, that list included several of the people here in this room, possibly including B’orel himself. But it would not be conducive to Phlox’s health to remind them of the fact.

  “Very well, gentlemen—and lady,” he went on with a nod to Councillor Alejdar, a dignified, middle-aged Klingon who was the sole female on the High Council. “Then I will simply have to do my best to identify the viral strain using the equipment I have. And that may take a good deal of time, so if any of you have other business to attend to . . .”

  “We will not leave you unwatched, Denobulan,” Khorkal intoned.

  Phlox shrugged. “Then perhaps you could arrange to take turns.”

  The councillors grumbled and blustered, but as Phlox went about his meticulous work with the genetic sequencer, they grew increasingly restless, and within another hour, most had wandered off to deal with other things. B’orel stayed and kept his suspicious gaze on Phlox at every moment, but otherwise, the only one who remained the full time was Councillor Deqan, the appointed Arbiter of Succession responsible for overseeing the rites by which the new chancellor would be selected. Deqan was unusually quiet and even-tempered for a Klingon, content to observe rather than intimidate, which Phlox appreciated greatly.

  The sheer size of this virus’s genome—well over a million base-pairs in length, carrying nearly two thousand different genes—made it difficult and time-consuming to track down the telltales Phlox was looking for. The majority of the genes were consistent with the genomic “vocabulary” of Qo’noSian life, as one would expect from a virus able to interface with Klingon cells. But there were anomalies in the sequence whose origins proved more elusive. Comparison with Klingon medical databases let him identify many of them as originating on the farming colony of Pheben. “Perhaps a mutation that arose there,” Kon’Jef suggested, “and was carried in the chancellor’s food.”

  “Not out of the question, given your fondness for uncooked meals,” Phlox agreed. “But there’s something here that looks familiar, and that shouldn’t be, because I’ve never studied a Pheben genome before.”

  “Familiar how? You have seen part of the sequence before?”

  “Not so much the sequence as . . .” He kept the rest to himself: the way the pieces are put together. He was beginning to recognize the artist’s hand.

  It was not the answer he had wanted to find.

  • • •

  Phlox managed to persuade Deqan and Kon’Jef that he needed to consult confidentially with a colleague in the Interspecies Medical Exchange. B’orel was instantly suspicious, but Phlox rode heavily on his physician’s honor as it pertained to patient confidentiality, so the arbiter agreed to grant him privacy over the councillor’s objection. Phlox expected that the Council’s agents would attempt to monitor his call despite this, but he used a couple of tricks Hoshi Sato had taught him to ensure that his call to the Qu’Vat Colony would be unseen and untraced.

  The face that appeared on the monitor was broad and lined, but smooth-browed and framed by long white hair. “Doctor Phlox!” exclaimed Antaak, his eyes going wide. “It is a pleasure to see you again, old friend. To what do I owe this call after all these years?”

  Phlox spoke slowly, weighing each word. “I suspect you may already know, Doctor. I am calling from the chambers of the High Council. They called me in to perform a post-­mortem on Chancellor M’Rek.”

  Antaak looked stunned. “M’Rek is dead? I had heard rumors of illness, but they tell us little out here—”

  “Please, Antaak. Let’s not waste time with denials. I recognized your recombination techniques in the genome of the virus that killed him.” He sighed. “I felt I owed it to you to ask why before I revealed my findings to the Council.”

  “My techniques . . . ?” Antaak shook his head sadly. “Phlox, I have no access to recombinant equipment anymore. My career as a geneticist is ended. I have attempted to petition the Council to finance research into a cure for the mutation, as a chance to reclaim my honor, but M’Rek himself revoked my license.” He chuckled without humor. “I attempted, for a while, to pursue a cranial reconstruction practice, but the sentiment soon spread that such concealment of QuchHa’ status was fraudulent and dishonorable. Many still see us as unclean, contagious, even though the virus burned itself out a decade ago. They wish to ensure that we are marked as separate. Did you know they no longer allow QuchHa’ in the Defense Force to wear a warrior’s traditional armor? Or even a warrior’s mane?” he added, a hand brushing through his own long hair.

  Phlox pondered. “I would like nothing more than to believe you, Antaak. But if anything, you’re merely establishing that you had a motive for the chancellor’s murder.”

  “Never! I may have turned my back on military service, but I am still warrior caste! Whatever they accuse me of, I strive to live by the precepts of the qeS’a’.” Phlox recognized the name of the traditional text purporting to pass down the teachings of Kahless, the founding father of Klingon civilization. “Including the Third Precept, ‘Always face your enemy.’ Had I wished to slay M’Rek, I would have challenged him properly—and probably died in the attempt, since I am a doctor, not a soldier. But slaying him from afar with a virus, attempting to conceal my killing as a natural disease—which I assume to be the case given their need to consult you, Phlox—that would be no way to regain my honor. It would only compound my disgrace, and damn the House of Antaak for all time.”

  Phlox found himself believing his old colleague, though he recognized that he was predisposed to do so. “Then how do you explain the signature I found in the viral genome? The technique is yours, Antaak, I’d swear to it. And I may have to, unless you can give me another explanation.”

  Antaak had gone pale. It was some time before he spoke. “It cannot be. I could not have failed with him so profoundly.”

  “Antaak?”

  The aged doctor gave a heavy sigh. “There is . . . one other to whom I have passed on my techniques. Who has the skill in genetics and the access to the equipment . . . and who resides on Qo’noS. But I dare not say it unless I can be sure. Please, Phlox . . . allow me to see the genome sequence. I must know if his hand is there.”

  Phlox granted his request; it was the consultation he’d been hoping for in the first place, though under more troubling circumstances than he had imagined. Indeed, Antaak seemed to know exactly what to look for, and with each passing moment he seemed to age by years. “There is no doubt. The artist’s hand is as clear as fire to me.”

  “Who is it, Antaak? Who?”

  “It is Krit.” He spat the name through clenched teeth. “My eldest son.”

  July 13, 2165

  To Phlox’s eye, Doctor Krit looked much as his father must have in his youth—bulldog-featured (as Earth literature would have it) with clearly defined cranial plating forming a pronounced V shape over his ridged nose. But he did not act like his father would when brought to a meeting room within the High Council’s headquarters and confronted with the accusation by Arbiter Deqan, with the other leading councillors, Fleet Admiral Krell, and Doctor Kon’Jef also in attendance. “This is a lie!” he shouted. “I had nothing to do with the chancellor’s dishonorable wasting. Let me face my accuser!”

  “You face him now!” Antaak barked from the chamber’s large wall screen. “Do not compound your dishonor and mine by hiding from your actions, my son. I have seen the viral genome myself. Does a teacher not know the work of his own pupil?” Mercifully, the councillors had chosen to look the other way regarding Phlox’s deceit in contacting Antaak, given the payoff it had brought. “Please, my son. You face death for your crimes. Have the decency to face it standing up. Prove to me that I have taught you something beyond genetic resequencing.”

  The yo
unger physician studied his father’s gaze for a long moment, trembling with emotion. “All right!” he exclaimed at last. “Of course I slew M’Rek, Father! I did it for you! To avenge your treatment at the Council’s hands! You are not to blame for the plague that disfigured you—they are! M’Rek most of all! He deserved to die!”

  “Few would dispute that!” Antaak cried. “But not like this. Not from hiding, not in secret so that no one even knows it was vengeance! Revenge is done to restore a family’s honor, not corrupt it further!”

  Krit scoffed. “Honor. What is it? Just a word Klingons use as an excuse for doing whatever they wish. M’Rek claimed that his persecution of you served honor. Where was the Council’s honor when they ordered you to create the virus in the first place?”

  “That is enough,” said Councillor Deqan. The arbiter did not raise his voice, but his authority came through nonetheless. “You have confirmed your guilt. Do not compound your treason further.”

  Krit sneered. “If it is treason to speak the truth, then we are all damned.”

  On the screen, Antaak looked disgusted. “You have lost any right to speak of truth, Krit.”

  “But Father—”

  Antaak folded his arms before him. “My son is dead to me.” He ceremoniously turned his back on the younger man.

  “So be it,” Deqan intoned. “Krit, son of no one, you are found guilty of high treason and are hereby sentenced to death. Sentence to be carried out—”

  “Allow me.” Admiral Krell stepped forward.

  B’orel stepped in his path. “You are out of order, QuchHa’! Your filth should not even stain this chamber.”

  Krell swatted the leaner man aside almost effortlessly. B’orel recovered his balance and reached for his knife, but Khorkal and Alejdar stepped forward to restrain him. Deqan held out a hand and they fell still. Krell spoke as if none of it had happened. “Arbiter. I failed to protect the Empire from this plague or my patron from a dishonorable end. Let me reclaim the last of my own honor by avenging the chancellor’s murder.”

  Deqan looked around the room at the other councillors. Even B’orel could not bring himself to object. “Very well. Have Krit taken away. Prepare him for execution in the public square. All will know that the chancellor’s murder has been solved and avenged, so that we may proceed with the Rite of Succession without further taint from this matter.”

  Phlox closed his eyes as the murderous youth was dragged away. He had no love of the Klingons’ fondness for lethal penalties. But Denobulan medical ethics forbade him from intervening against death when such intervention went against a patient’s wishes.

  Before his eyes even reopened, B’orel and the other councillors had begun hectoring Deqan about proceeding with the selection of a new chancellor. Deqan led them out of the meeting room to debate the matter further, leaving Phlox and Kon’Jef alone with Antaak on the screen. Kon’Jef leaned over Phlox, speaking as quietly as his booming voice would allow. “My gratitude, Doctor. Now my husband can achieve a last measure of peace.”

  Phlox had an inkling of what the doctor meant, but he chose not to pursue the question. He reserved his attention for his old friend Antaak, who had turned back to face the visual pickup once Krit had been taken away, and who spoke as soon as Kon’Jef left them alone. “You have my gratitude as well, Doctor.”

  “I don’t deserve it,” Phlox said. “I’ve just gotten your son killed.”

  “He brought his shame upon himself.” Antaak paused and shook his head. “No . . . if any is truly to blame, it is I. His upbringing was my responsibility, and I failed, as profoundly as I did with the Qu’Vat virus.”

  “All we can do is try our best to lead our children by example,” Phlox told him. “I, too, have a son who failed to learn the lessons I tried to pass on to him.”

  “He did not follow you into the healing arts?”

  “Worse than that.” Phlox sighed. “His name is Mettus. My youngest boy, so you’d think I would’ve figured it out by then. But no. He allowed himself to be poisoned by hate toward the Antarans—a people who had once been our enemy, but whom we no longer had reason to oppose. Any wrongs they had inflicted on us had been ‘avenged’ long since, the scales balanced, if you believe in such things. There was no longer any reason to hate Antarans except that they were Antarans, and that was enough for Mettus. I tried my best to raise my children without prejudice, to open their minds to the possibility of friendship with all races, but Mettus allowed himself to be swayed by dangerous friends. And so I lost him.” He shook his head. “I don’t know if a Klingon can sympathize.”

  “We do not hate randomly, my friend. There is no honor in continuing a grudge that serves no purpose. The First Precept of the qeS’a’ is ‘Choose your enemies well.’” Antaak sighed. “But that does not matter. Deeper even than the word of Kahless is the bond between father and son. Death comes to us all, soon enough. It is through our children that we survive. And if our children reject our teachings . . . it is worse than the death of the body. I, for one, do not know how I will survive.”

  “Look on the bright side,” Phlox told him. “At least Krit believed he was acting in your defense. As misguided as it was, it was an act of love. I haven’t been so lucky.”

  “You are better off without such ‘luck,’ believe me.”

  Phlox shook off his solemn mood. “So—what will you do now, Doctor?”

  “I’m not sure. Perhaps now, with M’Rek out of the way, I can again petition the Council to finance research into a cure for the Qu’Vat mutation. Perhaps then I can help bring an end to the strife I have caused, and bring stability to the Empire at last.”

  “You know,” Phlox couldn’t resist pointing out, “you could simply learn to live together. To look beyond a cosmetic change and learn to cooperate. My people—most of them—have overcome their hatred of the Antarans and learned to work with them as friends.” He chuckled. “My daughter is marrying an Antaran man in just a few weeks. You’re welcome to attend the wedding, if you can.”

  Antaak gave the hearty laugh of a man who desperately needed something to laugh about. “Then you have my congratulations, Phlox! Though I fear I must decline, for I have matters of my own I must attend to. As for the rest . . .” He sobered and shook his head. “Such tolerance is not the Klingon way. These smooth brows show the galaxy that we can be conquered by a lowly virus. They are a badge of weakness, and weakness must be destroyed.”

  “Are they really, Antaak?” Phlox asked, his voice hardening. “The High Council has seen that you, a ‘weak’ QuchHa’, acted with true honor and courage, while your HemQuch son acted with treachery and shame. Perhaps they will learn something from that. And if they don’t . . . then at least you should.”

  July 15, 2165

  Starfleet Headquarters, San Francisco

  “And do you think Antaak listened?” Jonathan Archer asked Phlox. He had his desk monitor turned around so he could pace the office while receiving the doctor’s report from the Xarantine freighter that was bringing him back to Federation space. It was one way he tried to avoid letting this job make him too sedentary.

  “I’m inclined to doubt it, Admiral,” the Denobulan said. “He seems more driven than ever to find a ‘cure,’ as he insists on calling it, for the viral mutation. He feels he must redeem his family’s honor at any cost.”

  “Do you think he has any chance of succeeding?”

  “Hard to say. The metavirus was incredibly aggressive, as you know, inducing systemic changes in nearly every cell in its host’s body. Normally, mutated cells will coexist alongside unaltered cells, and gross physical changes will come slowly if at all. You’d be surprised how many individuals are genetic chimeras—males with a certain percentage of female cells from their mothers, or the like. Normally it has no impact at all on an organism’s gross anatomy or overall body function. But this metavirus infects nearly every cell and
triggers it to regenerate, reactivating cytogenic and cytolytic processes that have been dormant since maturity. It’s really quite extraordinary, and it should be quite a challenge to overcome.” He shook his head. “Personally I feel Antaak is wasting his time, since the cosmetic and slight neurological changes have a trivial effect on quality of life. But if anyone has a chance of undoing its effects, he does.”

  “But not anytime soon, I take it.”

  “It could be a lifetime’s work. Or more.”

  “And from what you tell me, the Council is divided about how to deal with it.”

  “Indeed. Some want to exterminate the QuchHa’ altogether, others to exile them. Some simply want to declare war on the Federation as retaliation for Earth’s perceived role in creating the virus. However, I gather that one or two QuchHa’, the leaders of noble Houses whose wealth and status enabled them to avoid complete ostracism, have actually put their names in for nomination.”

  “Not Admiral Krell?” Archer recalled his contentious dealings with the fleet admiral, a stern, powerful Klingon who had at first hated Archer and Phlox for their roles in turning him into a QuchHa’ but had ultimately afforded them some measure of respect and become something verging on an ally.

  Phlox’s expression was grave. “I received word from Doctor Kon’Jef that Fleet Admiral Krell has died. Once he carried out the execution of Doctor Krit, he requested that Kon’Jef help him perform the Mauk-to’Vor, a form of assisted ritual suicide.”

  “Damn.” Archer winced. Why did the Klingons insist on seeing someone’s death as the answer to everything? Not only was it a total waste, but from a coldly political perspective, it had cost the Federation a potential ally in the High Council, or at least a voice of moderation. “Any idea who’s likely to be the next chancellor?”