One by one, the symbols transformed into those he could understand. Two recognizable symbols became three, became ten, became an entire line of deciphered code, all of which Riker began to find unsettlingly familiar.

  “Tuvok?” said Riker. “Are you seeing what I’m seeing?”

  “I am aware of the situation, sir,” said the Vulcan. “As, I suspect, is Mr. Jaza.”

   “Transcoding now,”said Jaza’s voice, but his tone was as grim as the Vulcan’s.

  A few seconds later, with nearly seventy percent of the signal acquired, they were all thinking the same thing.

   “That’s the best we’re getting, Captain,”Jaza reported. “There’s too much distortion to sift out the rest.”

  “Run what we have,” said Riker, moving quickly from the science station to the captain’s chair. “Let’s see this thing.”

  “The visual component is too corrupted for reliable translation,” said Tuvok mechanically.

  “Give me what you’ve got, Mr. Tuvok.”

  “Reconstructing audio.”

  A hush fell over the bridge as everyone waited to hear what some of them-those who’d paid attention in communication class at the Academy-had begun to dread.

  “*********** TITAN************* SENTIENTS ******* RECEIVE *************** DANGEROUS ********* EXPANDING ********** ******** ATTACK ********* HOSTILE ACTION ******** SPECIES ****** UNKNOWN ****************** *********************”

  The alert sounded near the end of Vale’s meeting with Counselor Huilan. She’d chosen to conceal the fact that it was a meeting by having the little psychologist accompany her as she walked the ship’s corridors, ostensibly on her way to the mess hall. If anyone asked, they were grabbing a quick snack before going on duty.

  Involving Huilan in her Plan B was not the course she would have taken had she not felt compelled, but of course that’s what Plan B’s always were-the less desirable alternative of first resort.

  Huilan had been reluctant to accept portions of the duty she was assigning, but when she spelled out the full picture, most of his misgivings vanished.

  “You’re mistaken about one thing,” he said in his growling chirp of a voice. “There’s no way I could be concealed inside a satchel or carried anywhere by most members of the crew. I’m small, Commander, but exceedingly dense.”

  Vale had actually smiled at that. Huilan was a S’ti’ach. To human observers, his people resembled small, blue, four-armed bears.

  On most Class-M worlds, such creatures were relatively unremarkable. S’ti’ach, by contrast, was a hyper g planet and, while its flora and fauna were compact by Federation norms, their molecular structures were another matter entirely.

  Though Huilan’s head barely reached Vale’s knees, his mass exceeded hers by a factor of four or five times. He’d be more likely to lift her than the converse. Hell, he could probably toss her from one side of the cabin to the other without much effort.

  “So, what do you suggest?” she said. “There’s no way either of them is going to sit down with you and bare their souls.”

  “Yes,” said Huilan thoughtfully. “Counselor Troi has been fairly blinkered about this matter.”

  It would have been stupid for Vale not to expect that Huilan had pegged some of the same symptoms in Troi and the captain as she. He was a professional, and he worked as closely with Troi as Vale did with Will Riker.

  She was both gratified and disappointed to know that her misgivings weren’t the result of generic XO paranoia. Something was happening with Riker and Troi, something unpleasant that neither of them would divulge.

  Vale and Huilan found themselves at the galley, suddenly assaulted by the clamor from within. The shift change meal was one of the noisiest, and this was no exception.

  “I’m not asking you to spy on anyone,” she said, fighting to be heard over the cacophony of chattering voices. “I just want you to get a look at them together, make an evaluation, and submit your recommendations to me.”

  “I don’t know, Commander,” said Huilan, clearly still somewhat dubious about the whole thing. “Clandestine therapies are extremely problematic. As is diagnosis without a close interaction with the patient.”

  Vale was about to counter with some Pakled axiom about using the tools one had, but before she could, the alert sounded.

   “All decks, go to Yellow Alert,”said Tuvok’s voice. “This is not a drill.”

  As the mass exodus from the galley got under way, Vale’s combadge chirped. Riker’s voice summoned her to the bridge.

  “On my way, Captain,” she said, heading out.

  “It’s one of ours. You’re sure?”

  “The signal was fragmented, but it had a Starfleet signature, Chris,” said Riker as she slid into the first officer’s chair beside him. “And whoever they were, they called Titanby name.”

  “So, we’re already under way,” she said as the dwindling black mass of Occultus Ora was reabsorbed into the larger pattern of streaming stars on the main viewer. “Any idea which ship it is?”

  “Not yet,” said Riker. “Aside from the fact that the signal itself is almost completely shredded, the gravity distortions in Occultus Ora prevented us from getting a directional lock.”

  “Clearing darkling system now, Captain,” said helmsman Lavena.

  “Thank you, Ensign,” said Riker, then, turning to his tactical officer, “Tuvok?”

  “The signal seems to have originated somewhere in or near the region of FSR-B2157, also called the Elysia Incendae system,” said Tuvok as the data came through. “A moment, Captain. Mr. Jaza and I are-” Tuvok stopped speaking and moved from tactical to the science station. “There is still some interference preventing us from pinpointing or communicating with the sender.”

  “What’s causing it?”

  “That is unknown at this time, Captain,” the Vulcan said coolly. Vale envied him his composure. Her own pulse was already beating more quickly than she liked, and she hadn’t even heard the distress signal herself.

  “Ensign Lavena,” Riker said, “what’s our ETA to the Elysia Incendae system?”

  “Twenty-seven hours at warp six, sir,” said Lavena.

  “Set course and engage.”

  “Aye, sir,” Lavena said as her sheathed fingers danced over her navigation console.

  “You think it’s Charon, don’t you?” said Vale, leaning in for a private whisper with her captain.

  “She’s closest,” was the grim response. “But it could be any of them.”

  Vale’s mind flashed immediately to the rest of the fleet. Including Titan, Starfleet had four identical Luna-class vessels exploring the reaches of the Beta Quadrant. The ships were spread across the region like microscopic pearls on an infinite ebony beach.

  The nearest of them, the U.S.S. Charon, was many parsecs away the last time her mission updates were transmitted.

   That was weeks ago, thought Vale. By now Charonshould be somewhere deep inside the Ring Nebula, not loitering around these parts.

  “What do we know about the Elysia Incendae system, Mr. Jaza?” Riker called out.

   “The cursory survey on record lists FSR-B2157 as a G1 star orbited by five planets, one of which is located in the habitable zone for Class-M life. However, the presence of such life has never been confirmed.”

  “The words sentientand specieswere both in the transmission,” Riker said.

   “True, sir,”Jaza acknowledged. “But we cannot know with any certainty in what context they were being used.”

  Riker turned to Vale. “Is Drakmondo or Fortis captaining Charon?” said Riker.

  “Captain Bellatora Fortis,” said Vale, punching up their sister vessel’s personnel files on her chair display. “Born on New Riyadh. Graduated the Academy three years ahead of me. Got her pips after the Second Battle of Chin’toka.”