Chapter Text
The familiar walls of Starfleet headquarters faded into view around Agent Samanthan Rutherford as the transporter cycle completed. Ensign Fletcher was manning the transporter console, as he’d expected.
“Lieutenant,” Fletcher greeted him as he stepped off the transporter pad.
Rutherford technically held the rank of lieutenant junior grade, but ranks didn’t matter as much for intelligence agents as they did for the rest of the fleet. That was a fact that most officers in other divisions didn’t understand, and Rutherford had long since given up trying to explain it.
“Ensign,” he nodded as he passed Fletcher on his way to the door.
“Hey, you’re in intel, right?” Fletcher asked hopefully, causing Rutherford to pause and turn his attention back to the ensign. “There’ve been a lot of admirals coming through here today, and I heard something big is going on. Can you fill me in?”
“I just got here,” Rutherford pointed out. “I don’t know any more than you do.”
Rutherford heard the door to his right swoosh open as Fletcher narrowed his eyes. “Oh, sure you don’t,” the ensign said sarcastically. “As usual, nobody wants to tell us lowly ensigns what’s happening.”
Rutherford was spared from replying by the person who’d just walked in.
“No, Fletcher,” Ensign Bradward Boimler corrected flatly. “Nobody wants to tell you what’s happening because you can’t keep your mouth shut about anything.”
An indignant look appeared on Fletcher’s face, but Boimler turned his attention to Rutherford and continued speaking before Fletcher could say anything.
“B wants to see you right away,” Boimler informed him. “I’ve got orders to take you straight to him.”
Most people knew very little about B, the enigmatic director of Starfleet Intelligence, beyond the fact that he was a three-pip admiral with grey hair who liked to smoke cigars. Rutherford, however, was not most people. When Rutherford’s parents had died in a shuttle accident, leaving him an orphan at the age of seven, then-Lieutenant Les Buenamigo had taken Rutherford in and given him a home. Now, almost twenty years later, B was like a father to Rutherford and was the closest thing to family that Rutherford had left.
Rutherford fell into step beside Boimler as they exited the transporter room and began making their way through the building. He was tempted to ask Boimler why B had abruptly curtailed his vacation and called him back to headquarters. Boimler was B’s assistant and would undoubtedly know the answer. But they were still in a public area and Boimler was a stickler for protocol, so Rutherford opted for a different topic of conversation.
“Any word on that transfer?” he asked as the two of them stepped into a turbolift.
Rutherford had gotten to know Boimler after Boimler had been assigned as B’s assistant. Boimler had gotten a series of Earth-bound postings after graduating from the Academy, and Rutherford knew the other man desperately wanted to be captain of a ship someday. The last time they’d seen each other, Boimler had mentioned that he’d put in a request to be transferred. Rutherford was hoping it had been approved, even though it would mean that B would end up with a new and probably less meticulous assistant.
“Intel division,” Boimler ordered the computer as the doors to the turbolift slid shut. The computer bleeped in response and the turbolift started moving.
Then Boimler turned to Rutherford with a glum look on his face. “They denied it. Again. And the promotion that B put me in for isn’t looking too good either.”
“I don’t get it,” Rutherford replied, feeling frustrated on his friend’s behalf. “You’re, like, the model Starfleet officer! What reason could they possibly have for shooting down your promotion?!”
Boimler sighed dejectedly. “I don’t know either. I’ve tried everything I can think of to get them to notice me! But nothing seems to work.”
“Well, hang in there,” Rutherford said encouragingly. “It might take a while, but you’ll get to that captain’s chair.”
The words didn’t improve Boimler’s mood. “Yeah, that’s what everyone keeps telling me. It’s getting hard to believe though.”
The turbolift arrived at its destination and the pair stepped out of it. They crossed the corridor to the door that led into B’s office. Even though the door was currently closed, they could already hear raised voices on the other side. The door slid open at their approach and the shouting became infinitely louder.
“Seriously?! You’re just going to sit here and do nothing?!”
A furious Beckett Mariner was standing in front of B’s desk. B himself was standing on the other side, and he briefly glanced at Rutherford and Boimler as the door slid shut behind them. If Mariner had heard the pair enter, she gave no indication.
B returned his attention to Mariner. “I’m not doing nothing,” he calmly but firmly replied. “I’m launching a full investigation—”
“Yeah?” Mariner sharply cut him off. “Well I want in.”
“Absolutely not,” B replied in a tone that made clear that no amount of arguing would change his mind. “You’re way too close to this. Rutherford will handle it.”
“This is bullshit!” Mariner irately exclaimed.
“That outburst just proves my point,” B countered. “You need to go somewhere and cool off. When you’ve gotten your head on straight, then we can talk about how you can help.”
“Fuck you,” Mariner spat. Then she turned on her heel and stormed out. She didn’t even seem to notice Rutherford and Boimler as she blew past them.
The door slid shut behind her and a wide-eyed Rutherford turned his attention back to B. “Yikes. I’ve seen Mariner angry before, but never like that. What the hell is going on?!”
B sighed and his shoulders slumped slightly before he replied. “Twelve hours ago, we lost contact with the USS Cerritos. They were on their way to Deep Space Five as part of a routine resupply mission.”
B moved around his desk and strode over to a wall-mounted screen. He started tapping buttons as he continued speaking. “When they missed their scheduled check-in, DS5 dispatched a runabout to their last known coordinates. When the runabout arrived, this is what they found.”
B finished tapping buttons and the screen changed to show a massive debris field floating in open space. Rutherford sucked in a breath.
“The wreckage is consistent with a California-class ship,” B continued. “The runabout detected no lifesigns, and no escape pods. As far as we can tell, the entire crew was killed.”
Shit. So that’s why Mariner was so pissed. I know she and her mom didn’t get along that well, but still… you always think you’re going to have time to sort that out later. Right up until you don’t.
“Any chance this was caused by some sort of malfunction?” Rutherford asked.
“It’s not likely,” Boimler responded solemnly. “Based on the debris pattern, we think the crew was attempting evasive maneuvers when the ship was destroyed.”
“So they were attacked,” Rutherford inferred. “But by who?”
“That’s why you’re here,” B replied. “It’s going to be your job to figure that out.”
B turned back to the screen and tapped a few more buttons. The screen changed again, this time to show the Cerritos’s flight path and the location where the wreckage was found.
“As you can see,” B continued. “Their flight path skirted along the edge of our border with the Orion Consortium. The runabout found energy signatures in the wreckage that could be consistent with Consortium weapons, but the analysis came back inconclusive.”
Rutherford’s eyebrows furrowed as he processed that information. “Wouldn’t be the first time that Consortium pirates raided one of their neighbors. Usually, they’re not stupid enough to raid us though.”
Piracy and slavery had begun falling out of favor in the Consortium in recent years. Partly because the Consortium had been seeking to improve relations with the other major powers in the quadrant, and partly because younger orions disapproved of such practices more than the older generations did. But despite those factors, piracy and slavery were still big industries in the Consortium, and Consortium ships still frequently raided less powerful, politically unaligned planets throughout the quadrant.
Rutherford continued his train of thought by seeking more information. “What are the Orions saying about this?”
“They’ve denied responsibility,” Boimler replied. “Using the same boilerplate wording they always use after a pirate attack.”
“Sounds like an open and shut case then,” Rutherford opined.
“Command agrees with you,” B acknowledged. “But I’m not so sure. I received a back-channel communique from a low-level Inquisitor, insisting that the Consortium had nothing to do with this.”
The Emerald Inquisition was the Consortium’s version of Starfleet Intelligence, with a mandate to protect the Consortium from all threats – foreign or domestic. Within Consortium space, Inquisitors had nearly unlimited authority, and outside Consortium space, they had tacit permission from the Empress to take whatever actions they deemed necessary to defend the Consortium. As a result, Inquisitors were legendary for their direct and often brutal approach to problem-solving. But they were few in number. Anyone who sought to join their ranks was carefully vetted to ensure their absolute loyalty to the ruling monarchy, and most aspirants didn’t make the cut.
“Hmm.” Rutherford’s eyebrows furrowed again. “That is odd. You trust the source?”
“More than I’d trust any other Inquisitor,” B replied. “I worked with her on a few missions, back in my field operative days. We’ve kept a back channel open for years, in case of something exactly like this, and she’s never lied to me before.”
“She could be lying now,” Rutherford pointed out. “They know that once word gets out about the attack, there’s going to be just enough publicly available information to make the Consortium look guilty, even if it’s all circumstantial. People are going to be demanding a retaliatory response, and if the President doesn’t give them one, it’ll make us look weak. Your contact in the Inquisition might just be trying to throw us off track or buy time for them to frame someone else.”
“Maybe,” B agreed. “But my gut tells me there’s something bigger going on. If the Consortium really didn’t destroy the Cerritos, and we retaliate against them, they’ll see that as an escalation and respond with an escalation of their own. Either way, things could get out of control very quickly. If we’re going to take that risk, we need to be sure they did this.”
“Hence why you want me to investigate,” Rutherford summarized. “How much time do I have?”
“Not much,” B replied grimly. “A few days at most. I’ll try to stall for as long as I can, but you need to work quickly and quietly.”
“Do we have any leads?” Rutherford asked. “Other than the wreckage.”
“Just one,” B replied. “And it’s another reason why I don’t think the Consortium did this. They’ve offered to give us sensor data collected by their listening posts along the border at the time of the attack… and to send one of their operatives to join our investigation.”
“Our investigation?” Rutherford repeated, cocking an eyebrow. “Not a joint investigation?”
“Yes,” B confirmed. “They’re being unusually conciliatory. They haven’t demanded any control over the investigation, and they’re willing to give us the sensor data even if we don’t accept their operative. They say she’ll defer to your judgement, and that she’ll fully cooperate with investigating any leads that take you into Consortium space.”
Hmm. That is a pretty generous offer. Doesn’t mean it’s real though. The sensor data could just be a distraction, and the operative could just be there to stop me from poking around anything they don’t want me to see… but knowing where they don’t want me to look would still be valuable information, and it’s not like I have any promising leads for them to sabotage. And if B is right, and the Consortium really didn’t do this, that operative could be a big help.
“Tell them I’ll accept both offers,” Rutherford decided. “Where do I meet this operative of theirs?”
“Bajor,” B replied.
Bajor was a strategically-located crossroads, sitting in between the Federation, the Consortium, the Klingon Empire, and the Cardassian Union. A decade earlier, after the Cardassian military had become too weak to maintain their occupation of Bajor and pulled out their troops, the Federation had offered to make Bajor a protectorate. But the Bajorans – wanting to focus on rebuilding their world and wary of being dragged into any conflict where they would undoubtedly be the first target – had refused.
Instead, they’d invited all four powers to a summit on Bajor, which had culminated in the signing of a treaty. Under the terms of the treaty, the Bajorans pledged to remain politically neutral, and agreed that they would never host any foreign militaries on their soil. In exchange, the Bajorans were permitted to maintain a modest fleet to patrol and defend their territory, and the major powers all agreed to come to Bajor’s defense if Bajor were ever attacked in the future.
Most people were skeptical that the Cardassians or the Consortium would actually honor their obligations if one of the other powers broke the treaty. But everyone knew the Federation was too principled and the Klingons too honorable to hang the Bajorans out to dry, so the treaty had nonetheless been good enough to keep the peace.
As a result, Bajor had become a popular location for both official and clandestine meetings between the major powers. But the fact that Bajor was a good meeting place in most cases didn’t mean it was a good meeting place in this case.
“That’s a problem,” Rutherford pointed out. “The clock’s ticking and Bajor is too far away. I won’t even have time to rendezvous with their operative before the shooting starts.”
B smiled slightly. “Head up to Starbase One and talk to L. She has some new equipment for you that will solve that problem. I think you’ll be impressed.”
“Understood,” Rutherford replied. He turned to leave, but B’s voice interrupted him.
“Oh, and Rutherford?” B’s face had softened and held a hint of worry. “Be careful.”
Rutherford nodded slightly. “I will.”