“You knew about this, didn’t you?” Vaughn said, hiking a thumb aftward.
“I was aware that a surgically disguised Starfleet operative had infiltrated the Kora II facility’s security contingent. Yes.”
Vaughn decided that Vulcan Starfleet officers must have to take classes in Exasperating Behavior before receiving their commissions. It just couldn’t be a natural talent.
“And you didn’t see fit to reveal that fact to me?” he said.
“We both knew that there was a significant nonzero probability that you would be captured. Had you been told of the presence of a third operative, you might have been made to reveal that knowledge under interrogation.”
Vaughn’s pique began to recede, at least where his Vulcan associate was concerned. “You wound me, T’Prynn. Do you really think I’d crack so easily?”
“You areonly human.” T’Prynn wore the only expression in her repertoire that even vaguely resembled a smile.
Vaughn ignored the good-natured jab. “You and I have worked together on and off for, what, thirty years now?”
“It has been twenty-eight years, nine months, and sixteen days since our first covert mission together.”
Vaughn offered her an I’ll-take-your-word-for-itnod. “I can understand why my lack of a ‘need to know’ might be mission critical. What I don’t understand is why the brass hats in Command sent herof all people.” He gestured toward the aft compartment.
T’Prynn raised a quizzical eyebrow. “I don’t understand.”
“‘Kree Omiturin,’” Vaughn said. “Come on, T’Prynn. Don’t tell me you haven’t figured it out. It’s an anagram for Ruriko Tenmei.”
T’Prynn nodded. “Ah. Your nemesis.”
“Please. She’s a colleague. I’ve made a habit of keeping up with her missions over the last few years. And she’s sent me messages now and then assuring me that she’s been returning the favor.”
“But you had never actually met her before today.”
Vaughn nodded.
“Then I believe I understand your frustration, Elias,” T’Prynn said, folding her arms. “At least in part.”
Vaughn saw that she was still puzzling over something. “Which part isn’t clear?”
“The source of your anger. Are you upset with Starfleet for assigning Lieutenant Commander Tenmei to this mission without your prior knowledge? Or do you resent being rescued by your biggest rival within the bureau—and on your very first meeting?”
He turned those notions over and over for a protracted moment before answering. “Those are excellent questions,” he said at length.
T’Prynn was clearly not finished making probing observations. “She infuriates you.”
“Yes.”
“Irritates you.”
“Yes.”
“Exasperates you.”
“Yes!”
“You are attracted to her.”
“Is it that obvious?”
U.S.S. T’Plana-Hath
2349 Old Calendar
The Ktarian freebooter vessel had already exploded, vaporized as though plunged into the heart of a sun. Vaughn couldn’t spare a moment to admire the spectacular blast.
He still had to make sure that T’Prynn got back aboard the T’Plana-Hathsafely.
Why did T’Prynn always insist on cutting her escapes so fine? Vaughn thought it was a positively non-Vulcan characteristic. But she always gets the job done,he reminded himself as he extended the console’s buffer memory and attempted once again to energize the transporter.
“Her pattern has degraded by sixty-two percent,” Ruriko said. She stood at his side, her hands steadier than her voice as she bridged emergency power to the targeting scanners.
Had anybody ever survived such massive signal degradation during transport? Vaughn wasn’t sure. He had to count on hope—and on the system’s multiply-redundant holographic memory matrices.
“Again.” They both touched buttons in a flurry of motion. Indicators and telltales flashed. The console whined. The transporter cycled.
Again, nothing.
We’re not giving up on you, T’Prynn.
The transporter made strained noises that Vaughn had rarely heard before. A film of greenish organic residue fell from a dissipating column of light, splashing across four of the pads.
Vaughn froze, gazing in Ruriko’s direction. Her huge eyes held the thought that he couldn’t give voice to.
T’Prynn was gone.
Mount Selaya, Vulcan
2349 Old Calendar
Conducted by several robed masters under the watchful eye of T’Rukh, Vulcan’s barren co-orbital world, the internment ceremony had been befittingly solemn. Vaughn also found the entire affair to be parsimonious and efficient. T’Prynn would have been pleased. Judging from the stoic expressions borne by the dozens of assembled family members and colleagues, it was easy to believe that Vulcans entirely lacked the concept of mourning.
Thanks to his long association with T’Prynn, Vaughn knew better.
Ruriko squeezed his hand tightly throughout the brief ceremony. She looked diminished, smaller in some way. Vaughn didn’t try to restrain the tears that rolled down his cheeks as the vial that contained T’Prynn’s mortal remains was interred in a family crypt beneath the ruddy, sunbaked sands of Gol.
After the funeral party and the guests had dispersed, Vaughn and Ruriko walked along a flat expanse of red-and-ocher Vulcan desert, watching the sun grow huge and orange as it began to sink over the horizon. The sunset painted the sky with every color on the pallet from scarlet to salmon to deep purple.
It wasn’t until an hour after the planet had slipped into night’s embrace that Vaughn noticed that he and Ruriko were still holding hands.
Together, they looked up at the eternal stars. In his mind’s eye Vaughn saw T’Prynn raise an ironic eyebrow. Had she been standing here, Vaughn thought, she might be tempted to comment that he and Ruriko would make a lovely couple.
Vaughn turned from the stars and looked into Ruriko’s eyes. She was watching him expectantly. Damn,Vaughn thought. It’s always the one you didn’t see that gets you.
San Francisco, Earth
2349 Calendar
Vaughn and Ruriko returned to Starfleet Headquarters for a day-long debriefing session immediately after their return from the Monac System. They had delivered Veruda’s computer worm, on target and on schedule. The countermeasure program—three years in the making, following the defection of Dr. Cren Veruda to the Federation—had entered the Cardassian grid at the Monac shipbuilding facility and had propagated itself via subspace relays before anyone detected it. As far as Starfleet’s premiere A.I. experts could determine, the artificial intelligence with which the Cardassian Union had been tying together its offensive and defensive capabilities was now completely inert.
Three years fraught with a series of difficult assignments now culminated in this balmy San Francisco Sunday afternoon. And Vaughn found himself—astonishingly—with nothing to do except stroll through the Golden Gate Park Arboretum, Ruriko at his side.
Ruriko paused to admire a rhododendron nearly as large as her head. She closed her eyes as she inhaled the flower’s fragrance. Vaughn smiled, admiring her long black hair, her delicate porcelain complexion. It was hard to believe that the first time he had met her she had been surgically altered to pass as a Cardassian torturer.
How things change.
Ruriko straightened and gazed deeply into his eyes. As though she’d read his mind, she said, “I’ve come to a decision, Elias. I’m not taking any more field assignments. At least for a while. I want to get back into nanotech research full time.”
She regarded him expectantly. Did she hope he might drop out of the field as well? It certainly would make sense; he was nearly twice her age, after all. But Vaughn wasn’t certain he knew howto quit.