They exited together to the sound of Xiang’s renewed threats to inform Captain Mello of Montenegro’s apparently customary lack of cooperation with the medical staff, and it wasn’t until they were inside a turbolift again that the commander did something that truly surprised Kira. “Halt,” he instructed the lift. “Colonel, may I speak with you?”
“Of course, Commander,” Kira said. “What’s on your mind?”
“I realize we don’t know each other very well, and I really shouldn’t be discussing this at all. But I think it would be even less appropriate if I brought the matter up with another member of the crew, and I could really use the benefit of an outsider’s perspective.”
Kira frowned. “What is it?”
Montenegro sighed as if searching for the right words. “It’s about Captain Mello.” He waited to see Kira’s reaction, perhaps thinking she might cut him off immediately for the breach of protocol. Discussing one’s commanding officer with a third party was a touchy matter, but Kira didn’t feel right shutting Montenegro down when this was clearly something he needed to unburden himself about. When she said nothing, he continued, “She’s become…I guess the word I’m looking for is distantof late. I don’t know how else to describe it. And it’s not just the occasional bad mood. I’m talking about a change in personality.”
That gave Kira pause. “Have you mentioned your concerns to the CMO?”
Montenegro shook his head. “Frankly, I’ve been afraid to. You may not know this, but I haven’t been the ship’s X.O. that long.”
Kira smiled. “How old are you, Commander?”
Montenegro looked embarrassed. “Twenty-five, sir. I received a battlefield promotion during the war. My assignment to Gryphoncame afterward.”
He feels in over his head,Kira realized. Like Nog, sometimes.The war had turned a lot of junior Starfleet officers into seasoned combat veterans very quickly, and fatalities among more experienced officers had resulted in young men and women being thrust by necessity into jobs many of them weren’t ready for. Becoming executive officer of an Akiraclass starship at age twenty-five must have been overwhelming.
“I really don’t know that I can tell you anything helpful, Commander,” Kira said finally. “It isn’t my place to advise you on your relationship with your commanding officer. I will say this: unless you feel Captain Mello’s behavior is putting the ship or members of the crew in danger, any changes she may be experiencing are nobody’s business but her own.”
“Of course, you’re right,” Montenegro said. “And it’s not that I think she’s become a bad captain. It’s just that…when I first came aboard, she took me under her wing. It seemed like we developed a rapport. Now I feel like I don’t know her anymore.”
Now, that I can relate to,Kira thought. “It’s a difficult thing when a person close to you changes, personally or professionally,” she said.
“You understand what I’m talking about,” Montenegro said.
“I think I do, but unless you plan to bring it up to Captain Mello directly, this is something you’ll have to work out yourself.”
Montenegro nodded. “Resume,” he told the lift.
They rode the rest of the way to Kira’s deck in silence. She found herself unable to think about anything except Shakaar.
Later that ship’s night, after Mello had commended Kira for her contribution in saving Lieutenant Commander Bhatnagar’s life, and various members of the crew had offered her their personal thanks, Kira retired to her cabin and tried to sleep. It came to her slowly; she was still wired from the day’s events. But after she finally dozed off, at the midpoint of Gryphon’s voyage and eighteen hours out of Deep Space 9, Kira was awakened by a call from the bridge.
“Kira,” she responded, forcing herself to alertness. “Go ahead.”
“Sorry to wake you, Colonel,”the duty officer said, “but you have a priority message from Deep Space 9. It’s encrypted for your eyes only. Shall I relay it to your quarters?”
“Yes, thank you.” Kira sat in front of the companel and keyed the message. After the computer verified her retinal scan and voiceprint, the screen resolved into the face of Leonard James Akaar.
“Colonel. I sincerely hope this has not reached you too late. But because I no longer know who you can trust, I felt compelled to send this as an encrypted recording, rather than try to speak with you live. I fear that the situation is more dire than any of us imagined. Listen carefully. We have verified that First Minister Shakaar was under the influence of an alien parasite, a member of a hostile and extremely dangerous species known to both Starfleet and Trill. This creature has been controlling Shakaar for months, using him to advance its kind’s hidden agenda, which somehow involved Bajor’s entry into the Federation. It was for this reason that Shakaar was murdered: to thwart whatever the parasites were trying to achieve. I know this news comes as a shock, but I assure you the evidence we have is incontrovertible. And more, we believe that another of these creatures has infiltratedGryphon.
“Ro was right about the assassin. We have captured Hiziki Gard here on Deep Space 9. There never was a cloaking signature leading toward Trill. We believe this was a ruse created by the creature aboard theGryphon in order to reach Trill and use the ship to attack the planet in retaliation. You cannot permit this, Colonel. The threat posed by this species is not just to Bajor, but to worlds throughout the Alpha Quadrant.
“Unfortunately, there is no way for us to know who the parasite has taken over aboardGryphon. However, there should be a classified security file in the ship’s computer, XENO-02884/1, that will tell you everything Starfleet knows about these creatures. You will need the following access code to decrypt the file: Akaar Kappa One One Seven Override Twelve.
“You must stop theGryphon from reaching Trill, Colonel, no matter what the cost.”
The recording ended, and for a moment Kira simply stared dumbstruck at the Federation emblem that filled her companel screen. Then her hands began to fly over the interface console, retrieving and decrypting Akaar’s top-secret file: a classified report from over a hundred years ago by one Fleet Captain Christopher Pike, detailing a disastrous first contact with a symbiont-like life-form inside a rogue comet. Three more reports from only twelve years ago by Captain Jean-Luc Picard, Dr. Beverly Crusher, and Admiral Gregory Quinn, describing a horrific conspiracy that almost succeeded in taking over the United Federation of Planets.
Prophets…
She read the file a second time, her thoughts a maelstrom of denial and realization. Part of her simply couldn’t believe the insidious nature of the threat they were facing: creatures that subsumed identities, attacking not only their hosts, but entire civilizations from inside. And all that time I kept asking myself what was wrong with Shakaar, why he’d been acting so different, why he’d changed so much…. It wasn’t really him at all, but some monster inside controlling him.She found herself wondering whether any part of him had understood what had happened, if the real Shakaar had been trapped inside all that time, screaming to get out while that thingused his body, his voice, his position….
Now another monster is walking the decks aboardGryphon.
Montenegro’s words came back to her: “She’s become…distant of late…. I’m talking about a change in personality.”