“Begging the ambassador’s pardon,” Vaughn said, “but since we are telling you the truth, the only consequence should be peace.”

Kamemor nodded. “Let us hope so,” she said.

Beside Kamemor, Vokar moved, striding behind the Romulan delegation and down the length of the table to its end, where he scooped up the padd Harriman had set down. “I will duplicate these data so that I can scrutinize them myself,” he said, his tone clearly signaling a challenge to Harriman and the Federation envoys. Ripples of color wavered across Vokar’s features, and Harriman glanced out the viewing port. In the distance, the remnants of the planet that had once orbited here refracted the light of this system’s star. Although he could not see from this vantage where Enterprisesat docked at the large central ring of Algeron, Harriman spied the underside of Tomedas the ship orbited the space station. “The scientists and engineers on Romulus can check these readings,” Vokar continued, “but I know what my crew observed, and I will have them examine the Federation assertions firsthand.”

“Please,” Gravenor said, “by all means, Admiral.”

“The Klingon Empire demands its own set of data,” Ditagh said.

“Of course,” Harriman said. He moved forward again and placed the other two padds on the table. “I brought complete copies for each of the delegations.”

“You may take a set of data, Ambassador Kage,” Gravenor said. “Please feel free to match what we have provided you with what we have provided the Romulans. We wish there to be no misunderstandings.”

Kage nodded in Gravenor’s direction. “Thank you,” he said to her, his voice unusually mellow for a Klingon, Harriman thought. He had never met Kage before, but he knew that the Federation Council held the ambassador in high regard. Evaluated to be one of Chancellor Azetbur’s most trusted and loyal adherents, Kage was therefore believed to be a strong proponent of peace.

“I will repair to my vessel now,” Vokar said, holding up the Federation padd, “so that my crew can begin to analyze these data.”

“Pardon me, Admiral,” spoke up one of Kamemor’s aides, an intense young subconsul named Merken Vreenak. “With your permission, sir, and with yours, Ambassador—” Vreenak looked to Kamemor. “—I would like to examine the readings myself.” When Kamemor said nothing, he added, “So that I may provide a direct report to you and this delegation.” He smiled thinly, an expression Harriman imagined people wore when sliding a dagger smoothly and slowly into somebody’s back.

“That will be acceptable,” Kamemor said at last. “That is, if Admiral Vokar has no objections.”

“Not at all,” Vokar said, and Harriman felt suddenly certain that the admiral and the subconsul had worked together previously. Vreenak stood from his chair and emerged from behind the table, following Vokar as he passed Harriman and headed for the door. Before leaving, the admiral turned and addressed the assemblage. “I hope to have some preliminary findings within the day,” he said. Then, looking directly at Harriman, he added, “Perhaps within hours.” His message—that he expected to uncover evidence of Federation duplicity—was unmistakable.

“Excellent,” Harriman said, unfazed. “We look forward to your conclusions.” Vokar rounded on his heel and left, Vreenak trailing after him.

Good,Harriman thought as the meeting began to break up around him. Vokar’s predictable insistence on having his crew study the hyperwarp documents at once would likely keep Tomedand Enterprisedocked at Algeron for several more hours. And that would be enough time for Harriman to do what he had actually come here to do.

Sulu paced her quarters anxiously. The sounds of her footsteps, muffled by the carpeting, reached her ears too easily, underscoring the stillness of Enterprise.Tethered to an alien space station, inside the territory of a hostile power, the ship seemed vulnerable. Should political tensions finally give way to warfare, the crew of Enterprisewould be immediately endangered, cut off as they currently were from the rest of the Federation.

“Damn,” she muttered. She felt powerless, unable to take any meaningful actions as events unfolded around her. Captain Harriman remained on Algeron with the special UFP envoys, presumably handing over hyperwarp technology to the two powers who posed the greatest threat to the Federation. Enterprisesat undefended and silent, its shields lowered, its communications blacked out. And Sulu shuttled back and forth across her quarters, arms folded across her chest, searching for something that she could do to help.

“Damn,” she said again. She considered going to the bridge and relieving Xintal, but she knew that there would be no point; standing another watch would not put her mind at ease, nor would it do for the crew to see her in such an apprehensive state. But she felt that she needed to do something.

Sulu walked to the outer bulkhead and peered out through the viewing ports there. Above, the tiered, circular form of the Romulan space station rose away from Enterprise,the lights from the station’s own ports evidence of the inhabitants and visitors aboard. Beyond Algeron, the unblinking stars rested in the firmament, voiceless observers to all that transpired within the galaxy.

Without consciously choosing to do so, Sulu picked out the two stars that roughly defined the ends of the Bonneville Flats. Like a recurring nightmare, the moments of Universe’s hyperwarp tests came back to her: the excitement she had felt, the numbers that had streamed across the sciences station readouts, the voices of the Universecrew. The sound of the explosion.

And then the silence. The terrible, cruel silence.

She knew that the specter of the Universetragedy would haunt her for the rest of her life. She would learn to live with it, of course, and there would eventually come days that passed free of the horrible memories, but it would never leave her completely. We have no comlink with theUniverse, Lieutenant Kanchumurthi had said from his communications station, and Sulu had known at that moment that tragedy had struck. There had been the sound of what could only have been an explosion, there had been the painful silence after it, there had been the zeroes on her readouts, but when Ramesh had reported the loss of communications with Universe,the certainty of what had happened had come to Sulu.

Each morning since the events out on the Bonneville Flats, she had awoken with thoughts of Universein her mind. She had found some salve in working with the Enterprisecrew to ease their pain, but only so much. Words and thoughts and actions could bring understanding and acceptance, and perhaps even closure, but the loss could never be lessened. Fifty-one people—fifty-one heroes—had given their lives in pursuit of a dream, a dream of exploration that would have been shared by all. Now, only the memories of those lives remained.

Sulu turned from the viewing port and walked over to the inner corner of her quarters, to her desk. She sat down and activated the computer interface there. It chirped to life, the image of Enterpriseappearing on the display. “Computer,” Sulu said, “list the crew roster of the U.S.S. Universe.”After the Romulans had revealed their knowledge of the testing out on the Bonneville Flats, and after Starfleet had opted to respond by fully disclosing what had taken place, all records of the incident had been declassified.

On the monitor, a list of Starfleet personnel appeared, blue letters on a white background. Sulu began to read through them, noting that Captain Kuwano had not actually held the rank of captain, but commander; an engineer by trade, according to the document, she had been designated acting captain for the Universetrials. Sulu recognized the names of the helm officer—Lieutenant Seaver, whose given name had been Doris—and the chief engineer—Lieutenant Commander Chernin, whose given name had been Alexei.