The deck plate lifted with a scrape. Quinn wedged the crowbar under the plate, grabbed it, and pushed it over. It clanged onto the deck with a bright clamor, like the pealing of a church bell. Droplets of sweat fell from Quinn’s brow.

In the scan-shielded space under the deck plate was a rectangular steel foot locker. “Give me a hand,” Quinn said. “Grab a handle.”

Bridy and Quinn lifted the weighty box from its hiding place and set it on the deck. Quinn’s fingers hovered over the digital keypad as he tried to remember the code to unlock it. “The guys I served with … I watched ’em kill women and kids. And I saw ’em do worse things than that. When I tried to report ’em, I got told to mind my own business. The commanders either didn’t care or were the ones who gave the orders in the first place.”

Staring at the lock, he remembered Denise’s birthday and tapped in the eight-digit code: 03262217. The case’s magnetic clamps released with loud thunks.

“They wouldn’t let me quit. Said I had to finish my hitch. I couldn’t just hide in my rack, so I spent my time gettin’ drunk, mouthin’ off at the brass, and playin’ cards.” He looked around at his ship. “By the time I got out, I’d won enough to buy ol’ Rosie here. But I couldn’t forget what I’d seen. The things I’d done. So I spent the rest of my cash on booze, and then I spent twenty-five years tryin’ to drown my memories.”

He looked up at Bridy and cracked a bittersweet smile. “Didn’t work. Now all I got left is this ship.”

And one last spark of my self-respect.

Bridy had a soft expression of concern. “I won’t lie and say I know what you went through, or how you feel. But nothing we do here can change the past, Quinn. The Denn’s fight isn’t ours. I understand wanting to help them, but the smartest thing we can do is respect the Prime Directive and stay neutral.”

Quinn opened the foot locker. It was packed with assault weapons, power packs, and explosives.

“I ain’t in Starfleet.” He picked up a rifle. “So fuck the Prime Directive.”

June 5, 2267

“These twenty rifles are all I got,” Quinn told his first platoon of Denn fighters. “Same goes for the power cells. So we’re gonna have to be careful about when we use ’em, and how much. If we play our cards right, we’ll scoop up some of the Klingons’ weapons off a battlefield. Then we can arm more of your people.”

He walked in front of the lanky, shaved-headed militiamen, who were lined up under the starboard wing of the Rocinante. Much as Quinn had expected, Naya and the landgraves had granted his request to recruit a score of able-bodied males to wage a guerilla war campaign against the Klingon occupation. Apparently, male Denn outnumbered females by a ratio of four to one, which gave the women elevated social status and made the men seem expendable.

The tallest of the recruits pulled the trigger of his weapon over and over; he frowned when nothing happened. Quinn stopped and placed his hand atop the man’s rifle, pointing its muzzle at the ground. “Okay, Stretch, give it a rest. That’s why I didn’t give you boys the power cells yet.”

Raising his voice to address the group, Quinn said, “Never put your finger on a trigger till you’re ready to shoot. Never point a weapon at someone you don’t mean to kill. These rifles are not toys. Use ’em right, you can kill a Klingon in one shot.” He patted a hand on Stretch’s chest. “Aim for center of mass. That’s the chest and gut. Don’t bother tryin’ for head shots unless you’re sure you can get a direct hit.” He held up his rifle to illustrate his next point. “When you carry your rifle, keep your trigger finger outside the guard, on the side, like this. That way if you trip or fall, you won’t blow a hole in one of your buddies by mistake.”

He took a few more steps down the line and stopped in front of a heavyset, well-muscled recruit. The man seemed like a natural soldier: his rifle was slung over his shoulder, his posture was straight, and his mien was serious. Quinn gave the man an approving nod. “Lookin’ good, Bubba.”

At the end of the line, Quinn about-faced and paced back the way he’d come. “I won’t take you men into battle till I think you’re ready. Over the next few months, I’ll teach you the basics of what you need to know to survive in the field: marksmanship, first aid, small-unit tactics, camouflage, demolitions. I’ll teach you how to disassemble those weapons and put ’em back together in your sleep.”

A reed-thin and awkward-looking Denn raised his hand, but Quinn cut him off. “It’s a figure of speech, Spaz. You won’t actually be asleep.” Spaz put down his hand.

“For the rest of your training, you’ll be splitting up into four squads. Stretch, Bubba, Spaz, Mudguts: you’re squad leaders.” The four recruits nodded. Quinn continued. “In the field, we will be outnumbered. We will be outgunned. Stealth and preparation can help us overcome those challenges. But the Klingons also have another major advantage: a starship in orbit. It has sensors that can pinpoint our locations on the ground. That means we will have the element of surprise only once, before our first attack. After that, we need to be creative. I have some ideas, but we’ll get to those later. For now, we—”

He was interrupted by the clattering of metal tumbling across the ground behind him. He turned to see that one of the recruits had already disassembled his rifle. Quinn marched over to confront the youth. “Tater! What the hell’re you doing?”

“Taking apart my rifle,” Tater said.

“I can see that,” Quinn snapped, glancing at the dozens of components littering the ground at Tater’s feet. “Do you have a plan for putting it back together?”

Tater nodded. “Yes. The reverse of how I took it apart.”

Quinn took a step back and gestured at the mess of metal. “Show me.” The recruit knelt and swiftly gathered up the pieces. Then, as Quinn watched with growing surprise, the young Denn reassembled the weapon in record time. As Tater fixed the last component into place and locked the weapon back into its safe mode, Quinn said, “Present your weapon for inspection.”

Tater—who’d earned his nickname by having a head shaped like a lumpy potato—held out his rifle with both hands. Quinn took it and checked its linkages. Everything looked right. He took a power cell from his jacket pocket and slapped it into place inside the grip. The weapon powered up with a gentle hum. Its main readout displayed its status as READY.

Well, I’ll be damned,Quinn thought. “Platoon, it looks like we have a prodigy on our hands.” He removed the power cell from Tater’s weapon and handed the rifle back to the recruit. “Do we have any more mechanical geniuses in our midst?”

Several of the recruits exchanged wary looks.

Each man in the platoon began taking apart his rifle.

Quinn stared, dumbstruck, as all twenty Denn exhibited a skill he had not yet taught them. Almost in unison, they finished their disassemblies. When they all came to rest kneeling before their discombobulated weapons, Quinn said, “Reassemble.” With the same speed and graceful precision, the Denn restored their rifles to working order. Quinn inspected each weapon by inserting the power cell. Every rifle’s display read ready.

“Quick learners,” he said. “Good. That just saved us a day. If you’re this handy with explosives, we might be ready to face the Klingons sooner than I thought.”

The Denn recruits beamed with pride.

Then a female voice cut the moment down to size.

“You boys should know what you’re really getting into,” said Bridy Mac, who was standing at the entrance to the secret tunnel that led to the Rocinante’s hiding place. She walked toward the line of recruits, who turned to face her. “This isn’t some game you’ve signed up for.”

Quinn bristled at the interruption of his training. “They know that,” he said.