Simon paused, scratching at his crest like he was trying to excavate it. His sunken eyes looked into Kyle’s meaningfully. Kyle was silent—Simon had a lot on his mind, and he’d spill it, given time—and waited. Finally, Simon continued. “But those guys—Heidl especially, but also Roone and what’s his name, Latriso Bistwinela—they’re so secretive you’d think they were working for the other side. They’re not, I’m sure—they came on Starfleet ships, and their research seems to have Federation support—but their attitude is such that it worries me. And then, from what little I’ve been able to glean by talking to other researchers, I’m not sure the Federation is precisely sure what it’s supporting in that lab.”

“What do you mean?” asked Kyle.

“This far from home, it’s very hard for the Federation to keep real tabs on anything. Yes, we send back reports and data, but reports can say anything we want them to, and data can be doctored. Falsified. I could say I’m working with subatomic pulses in deep space, while really I could be spending my days with holodeck simulations of Orion slave girls. It’s unlikely that anyone at Federation headquarters understands much of what my data shows anyway, so they believe what I tell them, for the most part.”

“So you think that team is working on something other than what they say they’re working on?”

“That’s the thing, Kyle. They don’t even have a cover story. It would be the easiest thing in the world for them to tell us they’re performing some simple experiment or other. But we might ask them how it’s going, or offer suggestions. They don’t seem to want even that much interaction with the rest of us, so they just don’t say anything. But Jenkins and Kauffman see the bills of lading from materials that arrive on every Starfleet vessel, and those materials suggest that there might be some genetic manipulation going on.”

“Which is frowned upon,” Kyle suggested.

“Which is absolutely illegal.” Simon had raised his voice unconsciously, and now he glanced around to see if anyone had noticed. “Illegal,” he repeated, more softly.

“Which is why you should report it.”

“Yes, yes,” Simon agreed. “I should. I will, Kyle. I mean, I have no definitive proof. But I have my beliefs, and those of several other prominent scientists on this base. We can ask that Roone and his crew be investigated—not that they’ve necessarily done anything wrong, but if they haven’t then they have nothing to fear, right?”

“Makes sense to me,” Kyle had said.

And report it, Simon had, Kyle remembered. The Federation officials had taken it seriously enough that a hearing had been scheduled, and Starfleet sent a ship out to 311 with an investigative team on board. The team had arrived at the starbase, and the starship—the Berlin,an Excelsior-class ship, Kyle recalled—had made arrangements to come back in several days to pick the team up.

But the day after the team arrived—the day the scientists were to explain what they’d been working on—was also the day the Tholians attacked. At the time, Kyle thought the attack had been prompted by the Berlin’svisit, as if the Tholians, barely able to tolerate a starbase, had been set off by the unexpected arrival of a heavy cruiser, instead of the smaller Oberth-class ships usually used to supply the station.

Whatever had prompted the attack, it had come suddenly and without notice, almost as soon as the Berlinwas too far away to return in time to help. Tholian warship activity in the sector was commonplace, as would be expected so close to their well-defended boundaries, so no one gave much thought to the approach of six ships until they crossed out of Tholian Assembly space and neared 311.

Kyle had been sleeping in his quarters when the Tholians had come close enough to raise alarms. He’d been called to the starbase’s command center, and by the time the turbolift got him there a red alert had been issued. Klaxons blared, flashing red lights declared a state of emergency, and Starfleet officers ran to their battle stations. This was precisely why Kyle was stationed here.

But the assumption had been that any Tholian incursion would come after a breakdown in negotiations, or after some aggressive posturing on their part. None of their battle simulations had included a seemingly unprecipitated attack out of thin air. Starbase 311, being primarily science and research oriented, had shields and phaser banks and photon torpedoes, but that was the extent of their defensive systems.

When Kyle reached the command center, the first of the Tholian ships were heaving into view near the starbase. Powerful red lights from their ships shone brightly—Kyle’s first thought was that they were already firing, but it turned out not to be weapons fire. He was never sure what it was—just illuminating their target, he guessed. But so much about the Tholians would remain a mystery to him. Whatever it was, when the first one appeared, Commander Bisbee, the ranking officer, looked at the red circle of light and said, “Looks like sunset over the Pacific.”

“I don’t like the sound of that,” Kyle had rejoined. “Sounds too final.”

Then the other ships pulled into position. Kyle had immediately started shouting suggestions to Bisbee, and Bisbee had instituted those as orders. Two Tholian ships were quickly knocked out of commission.

Two more, though, had started spinning an updated version of the famous Tholian web around the starbase. This web, instead of being a simple energy construct, had the additional effect of disrupting the station’s electronic systems. A message had gone out to the Berlinas one of the very first acts when the Tholians approached, but no one was at all sure if it had been received or if further messages were going out. Then other systems began failing—shields, intrabase communications, environment, weapons. As the Tholians began constricting their web, the starbase was rocked violently back and forth, slamming occupants and equipment alike into walls and floors. Sparks flew and control consoles burst into flames, and Kyle saw an ensign he knew cut in half by a computer bank ripped from its moorings and hurled into the young officer, crushing her against a bulkhead.

The two remaining Tholian ships pounded the starbase with phasers and plasma cannons. Kyle watched in horror as those around him died. Commander Bisbee was standing too close to a tactical systems control panel when it exploded, and a shard of tripolymer composite sliced through his carotid, fountaining blood across the room. The same explosion blinded Aikins, the security chief.

Starbase 311 consisted of two main rings built around a central core, which held power generation facilities. Kyle had often thought of it as two rings on a single finger, with just a little space between them. The upper ring was operational, and included engineering, navigation, and tactical departments, while the lower ring was the province of the scientists and researchers for whom the station had been built. During the attack, when comm systems were coming in and going out seemingly at random, Kyle heard a few moments of absolute panic as the Tholian cannons focused on the lower ring. Someone—he had always thought it was Simon, though he could never be sure—had tried to take control of the situation, though it was already hopeless. “Take cover!”the frightened voice had commanded. “Get behind something and hold on! It’ll be over in a few minutes!”

Other voices had screamed dissent, but the voice Kyle believed was Simon’s had overruled them. “I’m telling you, your best chance is to move into—”

But then that part of the lower ring had been breached. For a second Kyle heard the screaming of metal and polymers, then a great whooshing sound, and then nothing at all. Everyone in that chamber had been blown out into the vacuum of space.