“Seventy thousand qelI’qams,Captain,” Tonar replied. A moment later, he added, “We are close enough now that I’m detecting an energy reading from it. It’s faint, but it is unmistakable.” Then he turned from his console, his eyes wide with realization. “Captain!”

Kutal had already made the same deduction. “All power to weapons and shields!”

Despite the best efforts of the ship’s environmental control systems to provide a comfortable room temperature—even at their current rate of reduced power—Clark Terrell felt sweat forming beneath his tunic on his chest, between his shoulder blades, and at the small of his back. Around him, the bridge of the Sagittariuswas cloaked in almost total darkness, the only illumination being whatever was cast off by the few workstations that remained active. On the main viewscreen, which, like every other active system, was operating at less than half efficiency, lines of static crossed the image of the Klingon D5 battle cruiser that was closing to what Terrell considered a disturbingly small distance.

Anything less than a light-year is pretty damned disturbing right about now.

“Captain,” he said, his voice barely a whisper. He knew there was no logical reason to keep his voice low, as sounds would not travel across the vacuum of space separating the Sagittariusfrom the Klingon vessel, but he could not help himself. “I don’t think they’re buying it.”

From where he sat in his command chair, Captain Nassir also spoke in a low voice when he replied, “If they suspected anything, they’d have fired by now.”

That was not enough to convince Terrell, who also had been the last one to buy into the crazy scheme concocted by Vanessa Theriault to provide cover for the Sagittariusas it lifted away from Traelus II. Once it had become obvious that Master Chief Ilucci and his engineers would not complete repairs to the warp drive systems before the Klingon cruiser’s arrival at the planet, Theriault had devised a scheme to continue using the large deposit of thallium on top of which the ship had rested while on the surface. Employing the ship’s phasers, Bridget McLellan had excavated a large section of the ore from where it rested in the ground beneath the Sagittarius,carving away pieces and fragments until what remained was a somewhat oblong, lopsided sphere. When the time came for the ship to lift off, McLellan utilized the tractor beam to haul the oversized fragment to orbit with the Sagittarius,holding the hunk of ore before the ship like a makeshift shield. Dealing with the fragment’s mass had posed some challenges, which Theriault had overcome by reconfiguring the tractor beam emitters. The result was a haphazard thallium shell that—according to Theriault’s theory—would act to conceal the scout vessel from all but the most intensive sensor scans. Terrell had been skeptical throughout the preparation process, his doubts lingering even as the ship ascended from the surface and made its way into space.

“I don’t know if this is the craziest damned thing I’ve ever heard of, or if you’re just a genius,” he said, placing a reassuring hand on Theriault’s shoulder.

“I’m only a genius if it works,” the science officer countered. “If it doesn’t, then it’s going to be a long walk home.”

Terrell shrugged. “Look on the bright side. We probably won’t have to worry about that.”

For this ruse to work, Theriault had explained, and for the ship to appear as nothing more than a barren asteroid trapped in orbit around Traelus II, the Sagittarius’s power levels had been reduced to the bare minimum. All nonessential systems had been deactivated, and several other key systems also had been taken off line or else were operating in low-energy mode. The tractor beam emitters were generating just enough power to hold the thallium shell in place. Nassir had even taken the extra risk of ordering Master Chief Ilucci to power down the impulse drive, lest its telltale energy signature be detected by a sharp-eyed Klingon sensor officer. While the warp drive also posed a similar threat, there had been no choice but to leave it on line if the Sagittariuswas to have any hope of escape. Theriault and McLellan had tried to compensate for that by positioning additional, smaller fragments of thallium in the ship’s cargo bay. It was improvisational camouflage at best, though everyone aboard knew it would not have to work for very long.

It only needs to work long enough,Terrell mused.

Tapping a control on the arm of his chair, Nassir said, “Bridge to engineering. Master Chief, what’s your status?”

Michael Ilucci replied, “I can give you warp five from the jump, Skipper, but no more than that. If somebody’s planning on chasing us, it’s going to be a pretty short run.”

“I should’ve gone to law school like my mother wanted,” Terrell said, affecting a grim smile as he shared knowing looks with Nassir. Warp five had been an optimistic estimate from the chief engineer at the start of his repair efforts, and even though he had met that goal, it would not be enough if they were forced to flee the Klingon ship. The only option was a daring, perhaps even foolhardy plan to smack the enemy vessel across the nose before trying to make a run for it.

“Klingon ship closing to two hundred thousand kilometers,” McLellan reported, studying the sensor readouts on her console. “Their posture so far doesn’t seem to be aggressive. No more than normal, anyway, at least so far as I can tell. They look to be on a course for standard orbit.” She frowned. “The thallium’s affecting our sensors, too.”

“That’s the trade-off,” Nassir said, his voice calm and composed. Terrell nodded in agreement, as Theriault had warned them of the mineral’s effects on their own scanning systems. Anything more than short-range sensors would be all but useless, which at present did not matter, given the Klingon cruiser’s proximity. “Where are we in relation to them?”

Examining a readout on her console, Theriault replied, “We’re just crossing the terminator, and their orbital attitude suggests they’re not changing heading to come our way.”

“What do we look like to their sensors?” Nassir asked.

Theriault shook her head. “Hard to say, sir. Maybe a sensor void or dead spot. The thallium will affect their sensor returns enough to distort whatever visuals are created by their imaging processors. If they get close enough, they’ll be able to cut through the interference and maybe even pick up our power emissions.”

“They’ve got to be thinking something doesn’t add up,” Terrell said, shaking his head. “The question is whether they come closer to investigate, or just blow us to hell from a comfortable distance.”

McLellan called out, “One hundred twenty thousand kilometers. So far as I can tell, they haven’t raised their shields.” Terrell saw that her left hand hovered over the controls that would activate the Sagittarius’s deflector shields. Doing so now would all but ensure that the Klingon ship would fire on them, but if they raised their own shields before Nassir decided to act, then this entire crazy scheme would have been for nothing.

Come on.Terrell almost shouted the words. Just a few minutes more.

A red indicator flared to life on McLellan’s board, and the tactical officer looked over her shoulder at Terrell and Nassir. “They’re changing course and heading this way.”

“Damn,” Terrell muttered. “I knew it was too good to last.”

“Look sharp, people,” Nassir said, leaning forward in his chair. “We’re only going to get one shot at this, if that. Stand by.”

On the viewscreen, the image of the Klingon D5 cruiser solidified and took on sharper resolution, an effect of drawing closer to the Sagittariusand its compromised sensors. McLellan called out, “Ninety thousand kilometers and closing. Their shields are down.”