Kim took her hands as his eyes locked with hers. “I will,” he said. As she thanked him, the warm smile spreading across his face suddenly dimmed.
“What did you just say?” Kim asked.
“Thank you?”
Kim shook his head. “That’s weird. I thought…”
“What?”
“It came out more like Shershoo.”
A dull ache centered in Conlon’s chest began to burn. She had already begun to question her auditory processing abilities. Several times during the briefing she had lost track momentarily of what her fellow officers were saying or simply found her attention drifting. She had chalked it up to fatigue, but the other specter, continued degeneration of her brain brought about by her DNA’s inability to repair itself, was also a good candidate to explain her new symptoms. If speaking clearly was going to be added to the list, her ability to assist Harry and everyone else on board was going to diminish considerably. The thought of spending the next few days or weeks as a prisoner of sickbay while everyone else worked to solve their many problems wasn’t just unpleasant, it was terrifying.
Worse, Harry could probably see it.
A soft hand fell on Conlon’s shoulder.
“May I have a word, Lieutenant,” the Doctor asked.
“Of course.”
Kim continued to stand awkwardly as the Doctor waited for him to step away. Finally, he asked, “Is it all right if I stay?”
Conlon hesitated. If she insisted Kim allow them to speak alone he would want to know the reason why. She quickly decided that would create more problems than it might solve and nodded. “It’s a little late to worry about waiving my right to privacy. Go ahead, Doctor.”
“Very well,” the Doctor said. “I need you to report to sickbay right away.”
A twinge of nausea rippled through Conlon’s gut.
“Is something wrong?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” the Doctor said. “Under normal circumstances, I would have done at least two full biometric scans on you in the last few days. It wasn’t that long ago you came out of a coma. I need to make sure that your DNA hasn’t been behaving too inappropriately while you were busy saving all of our lives.”
“I feel okay,” she said. “A little fatigued, but that’s to be expected, isn’t it?”
“Stress exacerbates your condition, Lieutenant,” the Doctor said firmly. “Were it not for our—I was going to say unique circumstances, but who am I kidding, this is the Delta Quadrant—you wouldn’t even be on duty right now. As it stands, I’m going to need you to check in at least once every twenty-four hours to make sure there are no new issues we haven’t anticipated.”
Conlon looked toward Harry. He was doing a fair job of maintaining his composure, but it didn’t take a telepath to know what he needed her to say next.
“I need to check on the reactor,” Conlon said. “But as soon as the diagnostics are done, I promise I’ll stop by sickbay.”
“Very well,” the Doctor agreed before transferring himself back to the medical bay.
“It would be so helpful if I could do that right now,” Conlon said as she turned toward the turbolift. Kim reached for her hand as she did so. She stopped and forced a smile to her lips, hoping it looked reassuring.
“I’m going to be fine,” she insisted.
She wished she hadn’t been able to see so clearly in Kim’s eyes the doubt that followed that statement.
4
VESTA
Marion Dulmur’s face was nothing if not forgettable. Eyewitness identification was notoriously unreliable, but even so, Captain Farkas was briefly astonished by the lack of distinguishing features on the face before her. It was as if a computer had been asked to render “random white male” and succeeded beyond all expectation.
Farkas did suspect that this might be essential in his line of work.
“Thank you for accepting my transmission, Captain,” Dulmur said. “I’m sure you have your hands full out there and I understand that your time is at a premium.”
“You said you’re with the Department of Temporal Investigations,” Farkas acknowledged. “That means, like it or not, I don’t have a lot of choice when it comes to accepting your calls, Agent.”
“Director,” Dulmur corrected her gently.
“Congratulations,” Farkas replied.
Dulmur obviously chose to ignore the copious amount of snark conveyed in that single word. “I’ll get right to it, then. Are you aware, Captain, that your commanding officer, Admiral Kathryn Janeway, recently received a directive from our offices to return to Krenim space and attempt to open normalized diplomatic relations with them?”
“I am not,” Farkas replied. “Nor is there any particular reason why I would be until the admiral chooses to issue orders that concern me related to that directive.”
Dulmur’s stare did not waver. He paused, perhaps long enough to wonder if he was witnessing garden-variety courtesy or something a little more defensive, then pressed on. “The directive was issued by my former partner, Agent Gariff Lucsly. We are both unofficially concerned that the admiral might not be inclined to give his orders their due consideration.”
A chill ran up Farkas’s spine. “I’m still waiting to hear the part of this story that has anything to do with me, Director,” she said evenly.
One corner of Dulmur’s mouth lifted slightly, conveying faint amusement. Oh, good. He’s human after all, Farkas thought.
“You might not be aware, Captain Farkas, but your current commanding officer has, in the past, demonstrated a somewhat troubling tendency to ignore both the letter and spirit of our regulations concerning temporal manipulation.”
A chuckle burst from Farkas’s gut. Was Dulmur naïve enough to believe that she would have accepted this commission without acquainting herself with her commanding officer’s record in full, or was he trying to determine whether she shared Janeway’s predilections? Farkas certainly had her own issues with the admiral right now, but she’d be damned if an officious bureaucrat was going to school her on her duties as a Starfleet officer.
“Permit me to be blunt, Director,” Farkas began.
“That doesn’t seem to be a
