For the sake of brevity, she had substantially understated the situation. Never before had she seen a Tholian become so unhinged without apparent cause. Sesrene’s sudden seizure and retreat had alarmed her.
Jetanien stopped her with an upraised hand and loomed over a communications supervisor. “Mr. Stotsky, did you know that the Gallonik III civil war of 2177 was sparked by a single misstatement in its first treaty of global alliance?”
“No, Your Excellency,” the supervisor said cautiously, staring up at the enormous Chelon.
“A simple error, really,” Jetanien continued, ramping up his well-known dramatic lecturing cadence. “Its articles of territorial sovereignty contained conflicting geographical coordinates for the borders demarcating areas of settlement for its two rival sentient species. Historians chalked it up to a transcription error…after seven hundred thirty-eight million Gallonikans butchered each other over one of the most picayune clerical blunders in recorded history.”
“Tragic, sir,” the supervisor said, his voice cowed.
“Indeed, it is. Now imagine how tragic it would be if you actually sent this communiqué to Qo’noS with the modifier ’pu appended to that ordinarily inoffensive noun. How do you think the chancellor will respond to such a heinous slander against his paternal grandmother? Tell me, Mr. Stotsky, do the Klingons strike you as a species inclined to laugh at our lack of facility with tlhIngan, or do you think it more likely they would demand an honor duel, pitting me in mortal combat against the leader of the Klingon Empire?”
“I’ll correct the error immediately, Ambassador.”
“Thank you,” Jetanien said, then resumed walking and tossing words over his shoulder at Sandesjo. “You were saying?”
“Ambassador Sesrene became incoherent for several minutes, then left in a hurry. He hasn’t responded to our requests for an update on his status.”
“And you didn’t see fit to advise me of this last night?”
“Well, it’s not as if he declared war,” she said.
He reached the door to his private office and turned to face her. “Are you sure? If I sound less than convinced of your analysis, Anna, it’s only because I find it refreshingly unburdened by the weight of evidence.” Resuming his original course, he stepped toward the door, which opened with a gentle swoosh. She followed him inside.
Sandesjo respected Jetanien’s political acumen, and at times she admired his ability to negotiate while under stress. Most of the time, however, she found that working for him was a lot like indentured servitude, with the added insult of knowing the condition was self-inflicted. He could be the grand master of tact and finesse when circumstances demanded it, but with his own staff he demonstrated a penchant for imperiousness.
Jetanien’s office was small and densely packed with display screens, all of which faced his simple, curved desk. Every screen snapped to flickering life as he entered, though none made any sound. It was Jetanien’s habit, Sandesjo had observed, to raise the volume on a channel only when it had snared his undivided attention.
The ambassador shed his coat, placed it on the ornate coat rack behind his desk, and eased himself down into a half-sitting, half-kneeling position on a piece of furniture custom designed to accommodate such a pose. “Has the Klingon ambassador deigned to join the conversation yet?”
“Not as such,” Sandesjo said. She opened her briefcase, removed a Klingon d’k tahg, and placed it on the desk. “Ambassador Lugok left this for you.”
Jetanien leaned forward and scrutinized the ceremonial dagger. “Left it? Where?”
“In Meyer’s leg.”
She was surprised that Jetanien hadn’t heard about last night’s incident in Manón’s Cabaret. The brief but profanity-laced altercation between Lugok, the Klingon Empire’s most irascible blowhard, and Dietrich Meyer, the Federation Diplomatic Corps’s most notorious drunkard, was already well on its way to becoming the stuff of legend.
“I’d express my sympathy for Meyer’s pain if I thought he’d actually felt any,” Jetanien said. “He’ll recover, I presume?”
“Dr. Fisher says he’ll be fit for duty by tomorrow.”
“ ‘Fit for duty’? That would be an improvement.”
Sandesjo struggled not to roll her eyes. So much for being diplomatic. “Regardless, it might be best to assign a new envoy to the Klingon delegation.”
Jetanien acknowledged the suggestion with a grunt. “Who do you think Lugok would hate more—Sovik or Karumé?”
“A difficult choice, sir,” Sandesjo said. “The Klingons are unlikely to respect Mr. Sovik’s logic as much as the Tholians do. Conversely, Ms. Karumé’s abrasive negotiating style, despite its resemblance to Klingon manners, might prove inflammatory.”
“Your instincts, Anna. Make a snap judgment.”
“Sovik’s reticence would be seen as weakness by the Klingons. Send them Karumé. They might hate her, but at least they’ll understand her.”
“Very well,” Jetanien said, picking up a sealed envelope from Commodore Reyes’s office and slicing it open with the deft pass of a single claw. He plucked the single-page letter from inside and scanned it. “Clear my schedule from 1300 to 1500.”
“Yes, sir. Shall I—”
“Notify Ms. Karumé of her new assignment. I want her daily briefing by 1800 hours.”
“Of course, sir.” Sandesjo didn’t know if she was asking unnecessary questions, or if Jetanien made a habit of cutting her off in midsentence as an ongoing cruel jest. “If there’s—”
“That’s all. Dismissed.”
Mustering her willpower, she left Lugok’s d’k tahg on the desktop instead of wedging it under Jetanien’s chin, then exited the ambassador’s office.
The walk back to her own miserably cramped, windowless office was brief, but she still managed to be intercepted by five different foreign-service officers with urgent diplomatic crises for Jetanien’s attention. It would be up to her to sort the true emergencies from the petty distractions before letting any of these requests reach the ambassador’s desk.
She passed through the door into her private workspace and dropped her handful of passed briefings onto her desk. Slumping into her chair, she let her briefcase slip from her hand. It landed on the thinly carpeted floor with a hollow thud. So much to do, she realized. Sandesjo’s first official item of business, without question, was to inform Akeylah Karumé that she had been named as the new envoy to the Klingon delegation on Starbase 47. Everything else scattered across her desk was, as far as she could determine, tied for second.
All of it, however, would have to wait until she had completed one very important unofficial task.
Sandesjo reached down, picked up her thin, metallic briefcase, and placed it flat on her desktop. Before she opened it, she set its digital lock to a secret combination—one different from the sequence normally used to open it. When she lifted the lid, a false panel opened in the bottom of the case, revealing a compact short-range subspace transmitter. With the flip of a switch, it hummed gently into active mode.
The wait for an acknowledgment was always the most nerve-racking part of filing a report. Until the receiver locked in and finished encrypting the signal, there was an infinitesimal risk that their transmission might be detected and intercepted.
From the receiving end of the audio signal came a guttural voice, which uttered the challenge code-phrase: “bImoHqu’.”
It translated roughly as You look terrible. Sandesjo resented this cruel joke at her expense, this mockery of the pain and indignity she had endured in order to pass for a human and infiltrate the Federation’s diplomatic service. No time now for hurt feelings, she reminded herself. She swept her straight, long auburn hair from her eyes. Keying the transmitter, she spoke the prearranged response phrase: “jIwuQ.”