Torvin led Ilucci to the center of the deck, where he had installed a gray metal hexagonal platform that stood just over a meter tall and measured two meters on each side. The top of the platform was festooned with an array of smaller hexagons composed of a dark, glasslike substance. The enlisted man lifted a tricorder that he wore slung at his hip, keyed in a command, and powered up the repulsor grid. An ominous low hum filled the air for a moment, and then it faded to a barely audible purr. Shrugging out from under the tricorder’s strap, Torvin handed the device to Ilucci. “I set the amplitude, frequency, and angles according to your specs.” He pointed around the cavernous hold at five other devices: one on the overhead and one on each of the four main bulkheads—forward, aft, port, and starboard. “The load’s balanced on a six-point axis, has two redundant fail-safes, and can support five times the mass of the Sagittarius.”
Ilucci scrolled through the benchmark tests Torvin had run, then nodded. “Nice work, but if this tub drops too fast from warp to impulse we could plow right through its forward bulkhead and end up as a hood ornament.” He shut off the tricorder and handed it back to Torvin. “Do me a favor: hop back to the salvage bay and bring back some more inertial dampers.”
“Just me?” Torvin fidgeted and looked over his shoulder.
“Yeah, just you.” He paused and eyed his flummoxed engineer. “Why? What’s the problem? Afraid you’ll get lost?”
The youth palmed the sweat from his shaved head and absent-mindedly tugged on one of his oversized, finlike Tiburonian earlobes. “No, I, um . . .” He took a breath and calmed himself. “I don’t think the civvies on this ship are too thrilled about us ripping up their hold.”
The chief couldn’t suppress a sympathetic frown. “I wouldn’t be, either, if I was them.” Noting the fearful look on Torvin’s face, he lowered his voice. “Did someone threaten you?”
“Let’s just say I think it might be a good idea if we moved in pairs for a while.”
He gave Torvin a reassuring pat on the shoulder. “Noted.” Then he turned and waved to get the attention of the Sagittarius’s senior engineer’s mate, Petty Officer First Class Salagho Threx. The hulking, hirsute Denobulan nodded back, then crossed the cargo hold at an awkward jog until he joined Torvin and Ilucci, both of whom he dwarfed with ease. “Yeah, Chief?”
“Tor says the civvies have a bug up their collective ass about us gutting their boat, and he thinks they might be looking for a bit of payback on any Starfleet folks they catch alone in the passageways between here and the station.”
Threx looked unsurprised. “I get the same feeling, Master Chief.”
“Okay. Go with Tor and get a pallet of inertial dampers to beef up this repulsor grid. And if any of those grease monkeys start some shit, you have my permission to kick their asses.”
“Copy that, Master Chief.” The bearded giant of a Denobulan beckoned Torvin with a tilt of his head. “Let’s roll.” The two engineers walked toward the exit, both keeping their heads on swivels, looking out for trouble from whatever direction it might come.
Ilucci turned, hoping he might slip away to some dark corner of the freighter to collapse into a coma until his stomach cramps abated, but instead found himself face-to-face with another of his engineers, Petty Officer Second Class Karen Cahow. The short, indefatigable tomboy had grease on her standard-issue olive-green jumpsuit and grime in her dark blond hair, but she looked ecstatically happy. “I figured out how to mask us from sensors in transit!”
The bedraggled chief engineer tried to shuffle past her. “Good job. I’ll put your name in for a medal.” His escape was halted by her hand grasping the upper half of his rolled-up sleeve.
“Don’t you want to hear how I did it?”
Overcoming his urge to retch, he turned and smiled. “Are you sure it works?”
Her face was bright with pride. “Positive.”
“Then I’ll look forward to reading your report.” The perky polymath started to protest, so he cut her off. “Later. Capisce?”
His urgency seemed to drive the point home for her. “Got it.”
“Good. Now go make sure this boat’s ventral doors are rigged for rapid deployment. And if you need me, just follow the stench till you find my shallow grave.”
“Will do, Master Chief.” Cahow bounded away, a bundle of energy so infused with optimism that it made Ilucci want to drink himself stupid and spend a week asleep.
He made it to the cargo hold’s exit, where he collided with the first officer of the Sagittarius, Commander Clark Terrell. The lanky, brown-skinned XO had the muscled physique of a prizefighter and the razor-sharp, lightning-quick intellect of a scientist.
Probably because he’s both, Ilucci mused. During their years of service together on the Sagittarius, he’d learned that Terrell, in addition to having double-specialized in xenobiology and impulse propulsion systems, had been one of the stars of the Starfleet Academy boxing team.
Terrell cracked a brilliantly white grin. “How goes it, Master Chief?”
“By the numbers, sir. We’ll be ready to vent the hold and move our boat in here by 0300 tomorrow.” He rapped one knuckle against the top of his head. “Knock on wood.”
“Outstanding, Chief.” He studied Ilucci with a critical eye. “Are you all right?”
Ilucci swallowed hard, forcing a surge of sour bile back whence it came. “Nothing a year in the tropics wouldn’t fix, sir.” Eager to change the subject, he glanced upward and asked, “How’s Captain Alodae taking the news?”
The query drew a snort and a chortle from the commander, who shook his head in glum amusement. “Let’s just say I’m glad I’m down here with you right now.”
“That well, huh?”
“Master Chief, you don’t even want to know.”
Nogura stood his ground as Captain Alodae jabbed him in the chest with his index finger and raged, “I’m not signing anything! You people have no right to take my ship or my cargo!”
The thick-middled, heavily jowled Rigelian drew his hand back to poke Nogura a second time, only to find his wrist seized mid-thrust by the cobralike grab of T’Prynn, whose gaze was as fearsomely cold as her voice. “Control yourself, Captain.”
Watching from just beyond arm’s reach, the other officers at the meeting—Captain Adelard Nassir of the Sagittarius and Lieutenant Commander Holly Moyer from Vanguard’s office of the Starfleet Judge Advocate General, or JAG—tensed in anticipation of violence.
Alodae retreated half a step from Nogura and jerked his hand free of T’Prynn’s grip. A flurry of emotions distorted his tattooed face, then his nostrils flared as he drew a deep breath. Features still crinkled with anger, he bowed his head to Nogura. “My apologies, Admiral.”
Nogura replied with curt formality, “Apology accepted, Captain.”
Though he was obviously still furious, Alodae reined in his temper enough to lower his voice to just less than a shout. “My point stands. This is a violation of my rights, as well as the rights of my crew, passengers, and employer. You can’t just press us into service and use us any way you like. The Federation has laws against this kind of thing.”
“Very true,” Nogura said. “Unfortunately, we’re not inside the Federation.”
Looking as if he’d just been slapped with a dead fish, Alodae stammered, “Huh—what?”
Moyer stepped in from the conversational sideline. “I’m afraid that’s technically correct, Captain.” The svelte redhead flinched slightly as the fuming Rigelian turned his ire toward her, but she rallied her confidence and continued. “Despite the presence of Starbase 47 as a hub for colonization, commerce, and exploration, formal jurisdiction over this sector remains in dispute. And because this is a Starfleet facility rather than a civilian one, the only law in effect here is the Starfleet Code of Military Justice, which does, in fact, authorize us to commandeer vessels and personnel when required to defend Federation security.” She handed Alodae a data slate.