STAR TREK - SCE - 35 - Demon Bk 1

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Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

About the Authors

Other eBooks in the Star Trek™:

Starfleet Corps of Engineers series from

Pocket Books:

#1:The Belly of the Beast by Dean Wesley Smith

#2:Fatal Error by Keith R.A. DeCandido

#3:Hard Crash by Christie Golden

#4:Interphase Book 1 by Dayton Ward & Kevin Dilmore

#5:Interphase Book 2 by Dayton Ward & Kevin Dilmore

#6:Cold Fusion by Keith R.A. DeCandido

#7:Invincible Book 1 by David Mack & Keith R.A. DeCandido

#8:Invincible Book 2 by David Mack & Keith R.A. DeCandido

#9:The Riddled Post by Aaron Rosenberg

#10:Gateways Epilogue:Here There Be Monsters by Keith R.A. DeCandido

#11:Ambush by Dave Galanter & Greg Brodeur

#12:Some Assembly Required by Scott Ciencin & Dan Jolley

#13:No Surrender by Jeff Mariotte

#14:Caveat Emptor by Ian Edginton & Mike Collins

#15:Past Life by Robert Greenberger

#16:Oaths by Glenn Hauman

#17:Foundations Book 1 by Dayton Ward & Kevin Dilmore

#18:Foundations Book 2 by Dayton Ward & Kevin Dilmore

#19:Foundations Book 3 by Dayton Ward & Kevin Dilmore

#20:Enigma Ship by J. Steven York & Christina F. York

#21:War Stories Book 1 by Keith R.A. DeCandido

#22:War Stories Book 2 by Keith R.A. DeCandido

#23:Wildfire Book 1 by David Mack

#24:Wildfire Book 2 by David Mack

#25:Home Fires by Dayton Ward & Kevin Dilmore

#26:Age of Unreason by Scott Ciencin

#27:Balance of Nature by Heather Jarman

#28:Breakdowns by Keith R.A. DeCandido

#29:Aftermath by Christopher L. Bennett

#30:Ishtar Rising Book 1 by Michael A. Martin & Andy Mangels

#31:Ishtar Rising Book 2 by Michael A. Martin & Andy Mangels

#32:Buying Time by Robert Greenberger

#33:Collective Hindsight Book 1 by Aaron Rosenberg

#34:Collective Hindsight Book 2 by Aaron Rosenberg

#35:The Demon Book 1 by Loren L. Coleman & Randall N. Bills

COMING SOON:

#36:The Demon Book 2 by Loren L. Coleman & Randall N. Bills

#37:Ring Around the Sky by Allyn Gibson

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s

imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or

dead, is entirely coincidental.

AnOriginal Publication of POCKET BOOKS

POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon &

Schuster, Inc.

1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY

10020

STAR TREK is a Registered Trademark of

Paramount Pictures.

This book is published by Pocket Books, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc., under exclusive license

from Paramount Pictures.

For information address Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

ISBN: 0-7434-7609-3

First Pocket Books Ebooks Edition December 2003

POCKET and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

Visit us on the World Wide Web:

http://www.SimonSays.com/st

http://www.startrek.com

Chapter

Captain S’linth tasted the air. The bridge of the Resaurian shipDutiful Burden smelled of fear-sweat and

musk. The hard plates inside his mouth secreted digestive juices that burned with an acidic taste at the

back of his throat.

He stepped to the fore of the bridge, within striking distance of the massive viewing screen. Trusting his

crew to navigate the spit, S’linth allowed himself a moment to stare into the Demon’s face. Oblivion

stared back. The maw opened wide as the Resaurian ship descended, the Demon snarling at the stars

above, showing its hatred for all life. HisBurden trembled as a new wave broke over the bow.

“Tenris -units and closing, Captain,” said First Navigator Th’osh. “Gravimetric tides are increasing.

Perhaps we should make our offering now.”

An idea that would not sit well with the ship’s Council-appointed overseer. Looking back, he saw Suliss

stir, rising out of his self-induced torpor.

S’linth pouched his neck muscles. “Your scales are dry, Th’osh,” he snapped at the navigator. “Control

your fear, or slither back to your quarters. Tradition dictates our offering to be given at no farther away

than tworis -units.”

Calming, Suliss nodded. Among Resaurians, tradition held the full weight of law. Th’osh bowed his

head, nictitating membranes rolling over black eyes in a gesture of submission. “My apologies.” The ship

shook again, and Th’osh thumped his tail against the deck.

“Accepted,” S’linth told him, not wanting to ruin the Resaurian by frightening him out of service. Th’osh

was young, barely over his second adult shedding. By comparison, the soft scales on S’linth’s belly were

larger and darker than the armored ones on Th’osh’s back. The youthful navigator had several centuries

of life to look forward to, and would live better helping to maintain the small Resaurian fleet than he

would coiled up in a planetside nest.

“Any other difficulties?” S’linth asked. His obsidian gaze roamed the bridge.

Only his communications officer, Lyssis, met his gaze. “I am still detecting the subspace signal on our

emergency bands.”

He faced back toward the front of the bridge. The signal again. It had bothered him ever since breaking

orbit over Resaurus. An inconstant, open subspace signal. This wasnew. New always presented a

problem. “No modulation?”

“No intelligent modulation, Captain. It continues to act like an open channel, except for the slowly

shifting tone.”

“It is outside of tradition,” Suliss whispered. “Ignore it. We will make our offering, and return home.”

But S’linth refused to ignore anything that might prove a hazard. Space travel was not for the

hide-bound. He continued to consider possibilities. A beacon. A nonstandard beacon, since the tone was

not quite constant and would break off at irregular periods. An energy signature, warped by the

gravimetric forces. Something about it felt familiar, but nothing S’linth could find in the traditions offered

any help.

“Continue to monitor,” he ordered. “Science station, prepare the offering.”

The bridge crew functioned automatically, many following the traditional course of actions they had

learned by rote. Science announced that the offering was ready. Navigation called down the distance as

theDutiful Burden crawled carefully out over the Demon’s maw. This cycle, S’linth planned to take his

Burden to zeroris -units. As the vessel eased to a halt over the promontory, he crossed arms over his

scaly chest and spoke the Council’s words.

“May our offering ease any suffering, shine hope in the darkness, and keep the forces within banished for

another cycle.”

Science station launched the Resaurians’ offering as S’linth finished the traditional speech. A crash of

metal against metal leaked up through the deck, followed by an electrical scream as the firing mechanism

shoved the duranium-encased load out into space. On the viewscreen, it looked like a giant,

faceted-nose bullet being shot down the mouth of the Demon.

Something…

“Tracking,” Th’oth announced, busying himself with sensors feed. “Good signal. It looks as if the offering

will be accepted with favor.” He paused. “Signal is flattening out. Signal is constant.” Softly, but not so

softly that S’linth could not hear, the young Resaurian said, “Now we can get away from here.”

Signal is constant!

S’linth coiled about, turning his back on the Demon. Weak legs pushed out from his belly to form a

tripod with his thick tail, giving him greater stability. He pointed one muscular arm at his communications

officer. “The subspace signal! The beacon. Over what range does it vary?”

Lyssis recoiled, then turned her gaze back to her panel. “Over what time?” she asked.

“Since leaving Resaurus.”

“No more than twenty-five percent, plus or minus.”

Slowly, he turned back around to stare into the abyss. The Demon stared back. “And it repeats. In

between breaks, it must repeat.”

“It shows no pattern in between breaks,” Lyssis said, checking the logs. “No, wait. I see a repeating

pattern between the fifth and eleventh, and the sixth and twelfth recurrence. And…now between the first

and fifteenth. Captain? What does that mean?”

Suliss watched him intently, no doubt ready to argue that tradition demanded they return home. Now.

S’linth tasted the air, and the fear-sweat was stronger. Once his people learned that the Demon was

speaking to them, the scent would be overpowering. But tradition demanded that he tell his crew.

And tradition was law.

He nodded at the viewscreen. “I know what this is.”

Chapter

“Iknow what this is,” Sonya Gomez said, pulling her padd out of Tev’s meaty hands. “I don’t need

help.”

Having rescued her work from the Tellarite, Sonya carried it over to one of theda Vinci ’s science

workstations and relaxed into a chair, stretching her legs out, not caring that she blocked part of the aisle.

She usually enjoyed the bridge during beta shift. On tired evenings when she wasn’t studying the latest

journals released from the Daystrom Institute, she often wandered up. Ensign Joanne Piotrowski was the

duty tactical officer, and the two of them got on fairly well.

Sonya should have read more into the deadpan face Jo gave her when the turbolift doors whisked open,

and never gotten off.

“I only commented that it looked familiar.”

Mor glasch Tev had followed her. Hands clasped behind his back, with his monk’s fringe of dark hair

and frosted beard, he looked like one of her old Starfleet instructors about to deliver a lecture. Theda

Vinci ’s second officer certainly never showed reluctance in offering his opinion. The fact that Sonya

outranked him as ship’s first officer and head of the onboard S.C.E. team did little to dissuade the

Tellarite.

“Fascinating quantum degradation.”

“I don’t appreciate people reading over my shoulder either.” She glanced up at him. “What I’m trying to

say, in the nicest possible manner, Tev, is that I’d like to work on thissolo. ”

If the Tellarite was capable of showing chagrin, she had yet to see it in his first two months aboard ship.

His porcine features were perfect for smugness, though. Or well trained for it.

The maddening thing was that, in general, she approved of Tev trying to be more of a team player. He’d

started nicely on that road during the salvage of theDancing Star. Now, though, he was going too far in

the other direction, trying to be part of the team when she just wanted to be left on her own.

“All right. Let me know when you catch up.” He snuffled. “But I’m guessing that signal has been

bouncing around in subspace for close to one hundred years.” He shuffled off with the air of a

disappointed instructor who had just seen a promising student fail her first lesson.

Hah! This was actually a continuous signal being broadcast from only eighteen light-years distance. By

subspace standards, that was barely next door. She considered pointing that out, but Tev was already

back at another station working on whatever personal project he’d been on when Sonya arrived.

Interpersonal Skills Assessment, maybe? She wondered what his face would show after receiving a big,

fat “fail.” The way Tev acted, you would swear he had never failed at anything his entire life. Well, maybe

he hadn’t.

Until now.

She wanted to point out Tev’s mistake to someone. Not just for the petty pleasure it would give her, but

it might go a long way to begin making him more tolerable to the crew. Little mistakes might help ease

everyone into that transition.

Except that most of the second-shift crew were stringently watching their own consoles. No one had

wanted to draw the Tellarite’s attention, apparently, content to let their first officer act as the lightning

rod. Only Rennan Konya from security met her gaze, and the Betazoid would already know her surface

thoughts, wouldn’t he?

Konya nodded, then waggled his head from side to side as if unsure whether or not to agree with her

previous line of thought.

So much for that. She climbed out of her chair for a quick trip by the replicator, tucked her padd under

one arm while making her selection. “Hot tea, Earl Grey.”

With a light hum, the replicator materialized a bone china mug filled to the brim with her steaming

beverage. She picked it up, warming both hands around the mug, blew steam from the top and sipped

carefully. Perfect.

The Betazoid glanced over at her. “That’s not hot chocolate, is it?”

From the other side of the security, Tev snuffled. “You are two meters closer than I. You must have

heard her order. It is Earl Grey tea.”

Sonya groaned. Her run-in with Captain Picard—quite literally—had taken on all the hallmarks of

Starfleet legend.Yes, she had spilled hot chocolate all over the captain of Starfleet’s flagship while serving

aboard theEnterprise. Yes, she had taken to drinking Earl Grey—Picard’s favorite—as penance, and

then discovered how much she liked it. Some days it had seemed the entire galaxy was bent on making

her remember that awkward encounter, but the ribbing finally ran its course.

Then Galvan VI happened.

Two dozen crew replacements and months of grieving later, Sonya now wasn’t certain what was worse:

that the hot chocolate incident had resurfaced as a running joke among the crew, or that Tev couldn’t

even appreciate the humor.

She walked back to her station via security. “For a Betazoid,” she told Konya, “you’re pretty insensitive

at times.”

“Why do you think I opted for security?”

Of course, Sonya knew that wasn’t really the truth. Rennan made a great security officer precisely

because he was sensitive, in every sense of the definition.

Sipping her tea, letting the light brew slide down her throat, Sonya fell back to task, analyzing the signal

theda Vinci had pulled out of subspace. She double- and triple-checked her results, chewed on her

bottom lip for several minutes, and then kicked herself back out of the chair to find Tev.

The Tellarite was comparing the technical specifications of Romulan and Klingon cloaking shields. A little

light reading, no doubt.

“Ninety-three years,” she told him without preamble.

“Ah. Well, I only had a glance at the data, after all.”

Sonya shrugged her apology. “The data is in the computer. You could have pulled a copy for yourself.”

Tev turned away from his viewer, looking at her with his deep-set black eyes for a very long moment.

“You are my superior officer. You made it clear—doubly so—that you did not desire my help.”

“Right.” She turned back for her chair, caught herself. No, dammit. She’d build a bridge over this river if

it killed her. “Except we both see ninety-three years of degradation, according to the quantum shift, and

the signal originates only eighteen light-years distant.”

She had Tev’s attention. He scowled. Another expression for which his heavy-jowled face was

tailor-made. “The data does not make sense.”

“That’s what I’m saying.”

Tapping commands into the touch-sensitive console, Tev brought up the communications logs and a

variety of sensor readings. “Let us see if we can find your mistake,” he said.

Sonya gritted her teeth.

But Tev could not find a way to reconcile the data either. A minor victory, and one that did not appear

to sit well with the overachieving Tellarite. “Can we reconstruct the original signal?” he asked, a touch of

wounded pride to his voice.

“I’ve been trying to do that,” Sonya said. “At five hundred percent compression the signal approaches

something that might be an audio waveform, though it’s too far gone for the universal translator to match

up with any known language files.” She dumped her padd work back to the main computer and pulled up

audio at Tev’s station. It sounded like a lot of hissing, broken apart by a lot of static.

She supposed it could have been the other way around just as easily.

“Computer,” Tev said. “Return to original signal. Repair using the Telek System and then recompress

five hundred percent. Search language files and translate.”

“Telek?”

“Romulan,” Tev told her, and managed to do it in a way that suggested she should already know. “He

made contact withVoyager several years ago. Through a wormhole. I told you the signal looked familiar.”

“Ready,”the computer answered.

“Begin playback,” Sonya snapped, annoyed at Tev all over again.

A wash of static burst from the station, followed by a raspy, metallic tone.“…ellllf…aussz…”

Sonya leaned in. If she had heard right…“Computer, compress another twenty-five percent. Begin

playback.”

Close enough. The static was a sharper, more painful burst, but the voice clearer.“…help uz…”

They had the attention of the entire beta-shift bridge crew. “Help us,” Tev repeated, loudly.

Sonya nodded. “We have a distress call,” she said, then tapped a lighted square on her console to

summon Captain Gold.

Chapter

Captain David Gold had never been prone to nightmares, but the one he raggedly clawed his way out of

left him gasping for air. Not trusting himself to speak for a moment, he remained in his darkened quarters,

his deep, faltering breaths creating strange echoes that only heightened his uneasiness.

“Lights on,” he finally managed and blinked rapidly several times as his quarters flooded with light.

Though not large by any stretch of the imagination—he could cross corner to corner in about six quick

strides, provided he didn’t bump into his small desk or the bed—its familiarity nonetheless began to calm

his nerves.

Glancing at the chronometer, he saw that its uncaring surface displayed 0300 hours; he’d only been

asleep an hour.

Slipping his legs out from under the covers, Gold sat on the edge and rubbed both hands vigorously

across his face, as though the effort would scrub away the last vestiges of the nightmare. He stopped

when he realized that it still felt as though someone else were rubbing half his face. They’d told him that

the hand replacement was almost a perfect match and that his mind and body would quickly come to

accept it as his own. Yet, months later, on mornings like these, he could still tell. Holding out his hands,

he saw they were still shaking.

“Gevalt,” he said and slowly stood up. His wife Rachel might need multiple cups of tea, but once he was

up, there was no going back for hours.

After a quick shower and shave he returned fully dressed and sat at his desk. “Viewscreen on,” he said,

and perused crew reports and duty rosters for the coming days on the small desk-mounted console. He

continued on for some minutes before the realization struck that he was hiding from his nightmare. With

disgust he turned off the screen and faced what had awakened him so early; he’d never backed away

from the truth and he was not about to start now.

His granddaughter was just fine. There simply was no reason to believe otherwise. For a moment he

pondered the possibility of actually contacting Rachel back on Earth, but then realized the ludicrousness

of such an act. He couldn’t help but smile at the thought of the ribbing his wife would give him for such a

call. For a rabbi, Rachel had a mean streak in her. Better to face a Breen armada than years of that kind

of torture, regardless of its good-natured fun.

But if Esther had been hurt…or was sick…No. Rachel would contact him at once.

A chime sounded, interrupting his debate.“Gomez to Gold.”

Clearing his voice with a rusty cough, he put on his captain’s voice and tapped his combadge. “Gold

here. What’s up, Gomez?”

“Sir, we have a distress call.”

“I’m on my way,” he said.

Looked like there was something to be doing after all.

Both Gomez and Tev were on the bridge when Gold arrived; as usual, his best officers were already on

the case.

“What do we have, Gomez?” he asked before he’d even finished stepping onto the bridge.

Gomez punched up the signal and let it do the talking for her.

Static. Then,“We are trapped inside the Demon. We are running low on resources. Help us.”

“The Demon.” Gold tapped a finger against his chin. “Nebula? Plasma storm?”

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ContentsChapter1Chapter2Chapter3Chapter4Chapter5Chapter6Chapter7Chapter8Chapter9Chapter10Chapter11Chapter12Chapter13Chapter14Chapter15AbouttheAuthorsOthereBooksintheStarTrek™:StarfleetCorpsofEngineersseriesfromPocketBooks:#1:TheBellyoftheBeastbyDeanWesleySmith#2:FatalErrorbyKeithR.A.DeCandido#3:Hard...

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