The Future Begins Read online

  Speaking of which, he was still behind in his reading of the Kropasar Journal for Applied Biotechnology, not to mention the several hundred papers published by Federation journals on the issue. Tomorrow, he was scheduled to tour a gel production plant with Dr. Vantimor and some of her colleagues; he needed to be well informed if he didn’t want to look like a relic from another time.

  After cleaning himself up and changing into some Starfleet-issue pajamas, Scotty had the computer download his reading material onto two isolinear chips, loaded one of the chips into his padd, and settled down on his bed to read until he fell asleep. He hadn’t done anything like this since cramming for his last history final at the Academy. He was rather enjoying himself.

  Just as he was getting to the exciting part of the second paper—a discussion of realigning the nanotech processors to more efficiently process the neural-based output of gel packs without a loss in data density—he was interrupted by a beeping from the computer terminal on the room’s desk.

  Sighing, he heaved himself up out of bed, and crossed the room. “Scott here,” he said, pressing the appropriate button on the terminal.

  Commander Esperanza Piñiero, the Gorkon’s first officer, appeared on-screen. “Captain Scott, Admiral Nechayev has taken ill.” She seemed to be in sickbay.

  Scotty was puzzled. “I’m sorry to hear that, lassie. What’s wrong?”

  “It appears something she ate on Kropasar disagreed with her,” said Piñiero.

  Scotty nodded. “Probably those meatballs from Vega. I always thought Vegan food was disgustin’.”

  Piñiero shrugged. “Dr. Ezeafulukwe isn’t sure exactly what did it yet.”

  “I don’t mean to be rude, lassie, but I don’t know what this has to do with me. I can’t do much more than offer my sympathy. I’m an engineer, not a doctor.”

  “Admiral Nechayev was scheduled to meet with some members of the Witenagemot tonight,” said Piñiero. “She has selected you to take her place.”

  “Me?” Scotty asked, astonished. “Surely one of the diplomats would be more suited for the task?” He couldn’t imagine why anyone would want him to talk to a group of politicians. “Send that nice Morrow lad.”

  “Captain Scott, the admiral explicitly instructed that you go in her stead. The meeting’s at 2100 hours. I’m sending the location of the meeting to you now. Send me your padd’s network address; sealed orders will be encoded into it that you will be able to access at the appropriate time.”

  Scotty sighed. “Aye, aye. Tell the admiral I’ll be there.” He keyed his padd’s address into the terminal.

  Piñiero smiled. “Thank you, Captain Scott. I’m sure the admiral will be most grateful.” Her image blinked away, and Scotty checked the chronometer to realize he had a couple hours before he was due back on Kropasar.

  “What’s she playin’ at?” he asked himself. Well, he’d know soon enough. In the meantime, he had better replicate himself a nice, strong Mythran coffee. It wouldn’t do to doze off while he listened to some politician natter on.

  Scotty materialized in an empty corridor in the Kropaslin Curia. The lights flicked on in response to his presence. Checking his padd, he determined the room he was headed for was a little bit down the hall.

  Damn and blast, why am I doing this? He’d been thinking for almost two hours, and had yet to come up with a reason why he would be the best replacement for Admiral Nechayev at a meeting with some alien politicians.

  He reached the door, and he tapped the control on the wall next to it, causing it to slide open. Inside the room were seven Kropaslin gathered around a large round table. The table was mostly featureless gray metal, except for some computer terminals on the edges and a white ring in the center. As he stepped across the threshold, the door slid shut behind him with a clink he recognized as the activation of an electronic lock.

  “Take a seat, Captain Scott,” said one of the Kropaslin. Scotty recognized him as Thane Bendalion Iamor, the small fellow Nechayev had forced him to speak to briefly that morning.

  The chair closest to the door was empty; Scotty sat himself down in it. There was a small computer terminal embedded in the table in front of him; it appeared to be one of the most recent models to come out of the design facilities here on Kropasar. “Why am I here, lad? Why am I meetin’ with your government?”

  “We are not the government,” replied Iamor. “Not anymore, that is. As I mentioned to you this morning, I am the leader of the Agreement Party. High Cyning Forecic is a member of the Consensus Party; they currently lead Kropasar.”

  “I don’t understand what all your political wheelings and dealings have to do with me.” Scotty shifted in his chair; it had been designed for the unusual Kropaslin anatomy, and thus was rather uncomfortable to him.

  Another Kropaslin, this one a woman, spoke up. “Patience, Captain Scott. We will explain.” Scotty vaguely recognized her as someone he had been introduced to during the day.

  Iamor continued. “It was my political party that held power when we applied for Federation membership four years ago. In the intervening time, however, there was an election, and we lost our majority in the Witenagemot, though only just barely.”

  “The Consensus Party,” the woman went on, “is somewhat less…tolerant than us. They place stricter qualifications on freedom of speech, open less of their policies to public review, and tend to favor members of certain ethnic groups. It is just on the edge of what the Federation considers acceptable in a member government, and in all honesty, our application could end up with a rejection now that negotiations are on again.”

  “Why is President Zife pursuing your membership now, then?” asked Scotty.

  “There is a very good reason for that,” said another of the Kropaslin. “Allow me to introduce myself: Thane Dreso Miculamor.” This new fellow tapped a button on his terminal. The white ring embedded in the center of the table suddenly lit up, revealing itself to be a holoprojector. An image of a strange, asymmetrical spaceship came into being in midair.

  Scotty recognized the ship immediately. It was a Breen frigate. “The Breen?” he asked. “What do they have to do with your politics?”

  “I see you recognize the ship, then, Captain Scott,” said Miculamor.

  “Of course I do!” Scotty snapped. “Three of them attacked Earth. We haven’t stopped fightin’ them since.”

  “Indeed,” said Miculamor. “Several months ago, a Haradin trading vessel came across one on the outskirts of the Helaspont Nebula. All the escape pods had been jettisoned, but the ship was largely intact, with only some minor damage. We still have no idea why it was abandoned. I am sure you know Breen ships are biological in nature, and their level of expertise is rumored to exceed even ours. The traders could not make use of it themselves, but they sold it to our government—for a hefty sum.”

  “You have a Breen frigate!” Scotty exclaimed. “Starfleet would die to have one of those. The specs on that blasted energy-dampenin’ weapon alone could change the course of the war!”

  “Regrettably,” Miculamor said, “this ship does not appear to be equipped with one. In every other way, however, it seems to be identical to those Starfleet has faced in battle.”

  “Still worth a king’s ransom, then,” said Scotty. “If we knew everything about those ships, we would have a major tactical advantage.”

  “Yes,” said Iamor. “However, High Cyning Forecic and the Consensus Party believe the existence of the Breen ship should be kept as secret as possible, to maximize the economic and business advantages access to the superior biotechnology will bring our planet.”

  “I’ll bet Starfleet Intelligence still found out, though,” said Scotty. “No wonder the president suddenly made Kropasar’s admittance a priority.”

  “That is most likely,” said the female Kropaslin.

  “You may now access your sealed orders from Admiral Nechayev, Captain,” said Iamor. “The password is R0-XX4-HT33-L.”

  Scotty typed the code into h
is padd, causing a file to suddenly appear and open. He quickly read through it. “You want me to what?”

  “Captain Scott, your superiors want that ship, and we want them to have it,” said Iamor. “If they are going to…acquire it, they will need the coordinates of the spacedock where it is being analyzed.”

  “But why do you want Starfleet to steal from you?” Scotty shook his head. “These orders have only made everythin’ make less sense.”

  “The Federation does not honestly want Kropasar as a member,” said the female. Scotty suddenly remembered her name was Gilvatac. Or maybe Gilvatas. Not that it mattered much. “There are not only the democratic problems the Consensus Party presents, but a planet that will not disclose the existence of a ship that could change the tide of the war is obviously not the ideal member. The reason membership is being pursued now is the Breen ship.”

  “And we don’t want to become a member,” Iamor said. Before Scotty could state his confusion once more, he continued. “Federation acceptance at this time would provide an enormous validation to the Consensus Party in the eyes of the public. As the leader of the opposition, I cannot let that happen if we ever want to control the Witenagemot again.”

  “But why me?” Scotty asked, his voice almost a whisper. “Surely one of your people could provide the coordinates.”

  “No,” said Miculamor sharply. “They are known only to the handful of pilots that make the run between the spacedock and here. There is not a single member of the government, in either party, who knows them. They are, however, stored in our government’s most secure computer core. As your orders should indicate, that computer core is multitronic in nature, for security reasons.”

  That made sense, Scotty reflected. Multitronics was an evolution of the old duotronic technology that had been used in the twenty-third century. The Federation had abandoned the development of multitronic technology like most of the peoples of the galaxy and eventually moved in a totally different direction, to isolinear technology. Though multitronics had its advantages, isolinear computers had come to dominate because it was immensely difficult to create a stable operating system for a multitronic system.

  Scotty had seen the results of that problem himself. Dr. Richard Daystrom had used his own memory engrams as a model for the M-5 multitronic unit, which had resulted in the computer going mad and damaging several Federation starships before Captain Kirk had managed to shut it down.

  But according to the orders provided by Nechayev on his padd, the Kropaslin had managed to create a stable multitronic computer core. This made their data storage virtually invulnerable, as no one outside of the few Kropaslin who had designed it had the necessary knowledge to tap into it remotely. Every other computer on the planet was isolinear/bioneural in nature, and interfacing one of them with a multitronic system was something no one knew how to do.

  Except Scotty, of course. He had been there when Daystrom had installed the M-5 on the Enterprise, and he still knew exactly how it had interfaced with the standard Starfleet systems. “I’m the only person who can do it, aye,” Scotty said quietly. “Daystrom’s dead; the M-5 and its predecessors long disassembled. Everyone who worked with him is gone, too—except for me.”

  “Exactly,” said Iamor. He tapped a few buttons on his computer panel, and suddenly the one in front of Scotty lit up with blocks of code. “This is as far as our own programmers have been able to get; none of them have been able to make sense of the data.”

  “Everyone who worked on the multitronic computer is kept with it, well away from outside contact,” Miculamor explained. “We are a secretive people where our technology is concerned.” He made a gesture with his upper arms that Scotty interpreted as a shrug. “This is a necessity in today’s competitive market.”

  “You may begin now,” said Iamor.

  He, and with him every other Kropaslin in the room, looked expectantly at Scotty.

  Though outwardly he may have looked calm, inwardly Scotty was furious. He had been set up! Manipulated by Nechayev, by Piñiero, by Iamor and the other opposition politicians. This whole diplomatic function was nothing more than a ploy to get him into this room so that he could steal from the Kropaslin government just so the Federation Council could avoid taking on an undesirable member, just so these politicians’ precious bid for power wouldn’t be jeopardized.

  It was sickening. He could feel the vegetables from his kebab churning in his stomach, along with the ale and the coffee he’d consumed. He desperately wanted to visit waste extraction.

  Yet here he was. The door was locked, and he had his orders from the almighty Fleet Admiral Alynna Nechayev right in front of him, clearly signed and dated. Oh-so-conveniently, she wasn’t here. He couldn’t argue with her. And he had no doubt that the door would not be unlocked until he had extracted those blasted coordinates from the multitronic computer.

  There was no way out. He sighed, and cracked his knuckles before leaning down to take a good look at the screen on his terminal. “Well, I’ll have to give it my best shot, laddies and lassies, haven’t I?”

  At least it would be an interesting challenge.

  He could take some small comfort in that.

  When the beam released Scotty into the Gorkon’s transporter room, the first thing he noticed was Admiral Nechayev standing before him; Commander Piñiero was operating the console. “Glad to see you’re better, Admiral,” he said as he stepped off the transporter dais.

  Nechayev held her hand out. “Your padd please, Captain Scott.”

  Scotty slipped his hands behind his back, the padd still clutched in them. “I don’t think this is right. We can’t just steal from another planet.”

  “Captain Scott,” said Nechayev with a sigh, “I had hoped this would not happen. You know as well as I do that if the Federation wants to stop losing this war, we need that ship.”

  “Admiral, I don’t deny that! I just don’t think we should be stealin’ from potential member planets—or any other planets—just because it’s more convenient for us!”

  Nechayev shook her head. “Captain Scott, it’s not as though you don’t know Starfleet can be a little…underhanded at times. I seem to recall you once joined a commando squad on a mission into Romulan space to steal a prototype vessel?”

  “That’s not the same—” began Scotty.

  Nechayev cut him off. “And of course, you had no problem with stealing from the Federation itself when you conspired with Captain Kirk to sabotage the original Excelsior and steal the Enterprise out of spacedock.” She motioned to Piñiero, who stepped forward to right in front of Scotty, her hand extended. “Captain Scott, hand over that padd. That’s an order.”

  Just as when he had read the sealed orders earlier that night, Scotty couldn’t refuse a direct order like that. He brought his hand from behind his back, and dropped the padd into Piñiero’s hand. Piñiero flipped it on and skimmed through the data. “It’s all here, Admiral,” she said. “The coordinates, the layout of the facility, everything.”

  “Get to the bridge and break orbit,” ordered Nechayev. “The Catherine Mary is waiting at Delphi Ardu for that information.”

  “Yes, Admiral.” Nechayev held out her hand, and Piñiero gave her the padd. Nechayev gave some further orders about sending an apology to the high cyning for the abrupt departure, and then Piñiero left.

  “You don’t have to be rude to them as well, Admiral!” exclaimed Scotty. “At least do them the courtesy of finishin’ out your commitment here.”

  “I can’t afford to waste any time here, Captain Scott. Captain Wrightwell needs that information as soon as possible if his strike team is going to capture that Breen frigate, and we can’t risk transmitting it, even in code.” She skimmed through the data on the padd herself. “Good work, Captain Scott. I think you’ll understand if I can’t put you up for commendation, though.” She began to head for the door.

  “Now wait just a second, Admiral,” called Scotty, halting her in midstride. “I want to t
ell you somethin’.”

  Nechayev turned, a look of curiosity evident on her face. “And what’s that, Captain Scott?”

  Scotty paused for a moment, not sure if he really wanted to go through with this, not sure if he really wanted to say the words or not. Then he thought, The hell with this. “Admiral, I quit.”

  For the first time he had ever seen, Nechayev looked like she was at a loss for words. “You what?”

  “I quit,” he repeated. “I resign.”

  “Captain Scott,” began Nechayev, “surely—”

  “This has nothing to do with the stealin’,” said Scotty. “Well, it does, but that’s not the reason. The reason is that you manipulated me, Admiral. You deliberately engineered the entire situation so I would have to obey those orders.” Scotty wasn’t the type to disobey orders.

  That’s not true, Scotty thought. How many times did you disobey orders under Captain Kirk? But there was a difference. Under Kirk, Scotty had never been the one initiating the disobeying. He had always been following orders, really; it was just that they had been the captain’s orders and not Starfleet’s. And now the captain was dead…

  “What about your job with the S.C.E.?” asked Nechayev. It was clear that she still couldn’t quite believe that Scotty would end his Fleet career for such a reason.

  “Admiral, you yourself told me I’ve not been doing that at all,” said Scotty. “There’s nothing to tie me to Starfleet anymore.” In truth, there hadn’t been since he finished his work on the Enterprise-E, if even then. “This century’s Starfleet isn’t for me if this is the way it treats its officers.”

  He reached up to his chest, removed his communicator badge, and put it on the transporter console with a thump.

  “Where to, sir?”

  “Laddie, don’t call me ‘sir’ anymore. I resigned.”

  Ensign Dramar nodded absently as he ran through the shuttlecraft Irenic’s preflight checklist. “Sorry. But where do you want me to take you?”