"Cloud City"

[Atoz 77]

CLOUD CITY>>>>>

Captain's log, Stardate 53448.8: After completing a particularly tedious survey of dust cloud distribution in the Leo sector, the Odysseus is stopping over at Ardana to replenish stores. The crew is overjoyed at the prospect of shore leave on this beautiful planet, especially the famous Cloud City of Stratos.

"Look, Diane! Birds!" Iara giggled with delight as they emerged from the art gallery and into the bright sunlight of Perim Square on the very edge of the floating city, where swallows were flitting and twittering shrilly around the steel rafters of the building facade, and diving in and out of the fountain.

Diane Weir smiled. She should have realized that a fourteen year old would be bored stiff by an art gallery. At first Iara had really enjoyed the new experiences -– just the chance to get away from the ship for a few hours was pure heaven -- but as time had passed her restlessness had become apparent. And now by contrast the vitality and zest of those darting birds seemed to infect her with their energy.

Past the fountain, the floor became a broad, twenty-meter strip of transparent aluminum extending beyond the edge of the city's foundation structure, bordered on the far side by a slender chrome balustrade overlooking nothing but open sky. Iara ran ahead, unable to restrain her youthful high spirits. Mingling with the crowd of sightseers, she seemed awestruck by the view of the planet several miles directly beneath them through the transparent floor, spread out at their feet like a map.

"Iara, wait!" Weir called, straining to keep the girl's purple body suit in view as she dodged through the crowd and jumped onto railing. Weir's heart leaped into her throat as she struggled to fight down a surge of panic. Rationally, she knew that beyond the balustrade was an invisible force shield which encircled the entire city, otherwise at this altitude the air would be thin and unbreathable. It astonished Weir to realize that knowing this made no difference to her feelings whatsoever, as she hurried across the square as quickly as she could.

"Isn't it amazing?" Iara gushed, leaning over the top of the balustrade.

"Yes, it's quite impressive," Weir agreed, unobtrusively putting herself close enough to catch her, just in case she should start to fall. Is this what motherhood does to a person? she couldn't help thinking.

"I've never seen anything like this! I've never even imagined..."

Vents in the floor generated an artificial breeze in their faces, heightening the illusion that they were standing on the edge looking over a sheer drop. Looking straight down, the planet stretched out below them, its mountains and rivers and farmlands. On the horizon was a purple city. But there was no vertigo, since Stratos was so high. There was no feeling of falling, just of floating in space.

With the breeze ruffling her pale blue civilian blouse and her short brunette hair, Weir followed Iara's line of sight, trying to see with her eyes. Having grown up in the towers of Toronto on Earth, vistas of blue skies and clouds were nothing new to her. But for Iara, who had been born in a laboratory and spent most of her young life in spaceships, the view must be unimaginable. Weir was suddenly inexpressibly glad that she had brought her. Only one thing would have made the day perfect.

"You're disappointed, aren't you?" Iara said suddenly.

"Disappointed?" Weir said. "How could I be disappointed by Stratos?

"Not with the city, I mean. You're disappointed that he isn't here. The Captain."

"Are you reading my mind, then?" Weir asked, raising one eyebrow.

Iara rolled her eyes. "No... It's just obvious. You like him a lot, don't you?"

Weir snaked her arms around the girl, holding her close to avoid answering the question. If she had to sort out her feelings about the Captain...

"First time on Stratos?" said a young woman of about twenty five standing nearby at the railing. She had long blond hair with a tinge of green, her slender body adorned with a gold fabric dress that seemed to float around her. "I can tell by the way you nearly had heart failure when your little girl jumped on the railing."

Weir's cheeks colored slightly as she smiled. "Yes, it's our first time."

"This makes my seventh... no, eighth visit. There's always something new! My name is Josie! I couldn't help noticing your comm badge. Are you in Starfleet?"

"Yes. I'm Science Officer on the starship Odysseus."

"Oh, wow!" Josie said. "That must be so fascinating! I've always wanted to visit a starship! It must be amazing living on one! Have you ever seen the Blackheart Nebula? I cruised past it on a space liner once, but we only saw it from a distance!"

"I wrote a paper on it," said Weir. "We were there for almost three weeks."

"Oh gosh, you're so lucky!" Suddenly the woman turned to Iara. "And you? I don't think I've ever met someone from your species."

The smile went away from Iara's face. "I'm a Cardassian," she said defensively. Weir could feel the girl's body tense up in her arms, as if she was waiting for the inevitable backlash.

"Really?" Josie said, with not the slightest dimming of her smile. "Would you believe I've never met one before? You're not what I expected at all!"

To Weir's surprise, Iara smiled, and she wasn't a girl who warmed up to strangers easily, understandably given her background. She pointed out the birds, and the three of them had passed a pleasant time admiring the scenery.

A moment later, Josie said, "Listen, could I have your permission to Keep this memory? You see, I'm a Memory Keeper."

"A what?" Iara asked suspiciously.

Josie laughed pleasantly. "I'm sort of a professional tourist! I travel to places like this, and later I download my memories to make holo-programs."

"That's interesting," Weir commented. "I always assumed that holo-programs were generated by computer."

"Most of them are," the woman said. "They send someone through with a tri-D recorder, then edit out all the people. Then if you ask for Interactive, the computer puts in programmed characters according to a script somebody wrote! Blah! Where's the fun in that? What I do is try to capture the whole unpredictable travel experience! The drafty window seat in the shuttle, the tasteless replicated food, the rude waiters, the unhelpful guides. And of course the fascinating people you meet while you're taking in the view. If you give me your permission, you'll be part of the program. Sound like fun?"

"It does sound intriguing," Weir said, looking at Iara. "What do you think?"

The Cardassian girl frowned. "Does it hurt? I mean, downloading your memories? Does it hurt you?"

"Not a bit!" Josie laughed. "I use a psycho-tricorder. The worst part is constantly training my short term memory for details. Most people think that their brains record details easily, but they don't. You have to work hard at it."

"You probably use a thalamogenic enhancer, too," Weir said.

"You're Science Officer! You'd know all about that!"

"But why don't you just use a tri-D camera?" Weir frowned. "Wouldn't that be simpler?"

"Ah but a camera doesn't record all the little nuances, what it feels like to be here. And anyway people don't act like themselves when they see a camera. Would we be having this conversation if I were carrying one of those things?"

"I can't argue with that."

Without warning, there was a loud explosion from the direction of the fountain. Everyone turned that way as clouds of gray smoke drifted across the square. Half a second later, Iara tugged on Weir's sleeve and cried, "Look out!"

Some kind of missile had come into view from outside the city, headed straight at them. Weir instinctively grabbed Iara and started to move away from the balustrade, with Josie falling in behind them. The missile made an abrupt stop as it plowed into the invisible force field, causing a breach. The very floor seemed to sway as the air pressure inside instantly blew through the small opening with near hurricane force. The three unprepared women had no chance of fighting against it.

Weir lunged at the railing and missed. Her heartbeat raced with panic as she sailed through the force field breach into the clear, freezing cold air, Iara tumbling almost within arm's reach, as all three of them were swept helplessly out into open space!

[Atoz 77]

Captain Atoz looked around the conference table at the three young lieutenants and three even younger ensigns, all wearing red and black command uniforms. As Commander Fawkes went over their department's ratings for the last month, it couldn't be plainer to him that their minds were all elsewhere, probably shore leave. Atoz knew exactly how they felt; he was supposed to have met Diane and Iara at the art gallery in Stratos, but the Engineering staff meeting had gone longer than he had anticipated. But even though he sympathized, it was no excuse for sloppiness.

"So, Lieutenant Caeli," Fawkes concluded, "you will be taking over as Duty Officer for B shift, while Mr. Capek moves to C shift and Mr. Fletcher moves back to A shift. Do you have anything to add, Captain?"

The young men and women were already tensing in their seats, ready to jump up as soon as he dismissed them.

"Um... Yes." A disappointed sigh ran around the room as Atoz, who had been leaning back in his chair, sat upright and turned to face the three ensigns. "I just wanted to congratulate you three on the hard work you put in during your latest engineering rotations. Lieutenant Commander Vespis had nice things to say about all of you. Ensign Nickel, however, got a less than satisfactory on warp drive operations. I can't stress enough that when you become captains, you will need to know how the engines operate. Bear this in mind as you begin your Sciences rotations next week."

The junior officers all nodded. Atoz looked at his hands for a moment, then glanced out the portholes at the view of space. "All right, then. Dismissed."

The young officers almost leaped out of their chairs and out the door in one smooth movement. Atoz couldn't suppress a smile as he and Fawkes followed. But as they arrived on the bridge, Ensign Penner at Communications was waiting to accost him with a worried look on her face.

"Captain," she said, "I was just monitoring the Stratos City news net, and there's been some kind of disturbance."

"What kind of disturbance?"

"At first they were talking like it was some kind of attack," the girl said. "A bomb or something. Someone said the force field had been breached. So I asked Mr. Rosh if we should interrupt your meeting."

Lieutenant Rosh was the Tactical Officer, who had been temporarily left with the con. "I had her check with emergency services, Captain," the Eminian said. "They report only a small disturbance which caused a panic, but no permanent damage. The breach in the force field quickly resealed. They are still assessing the incident."

"We have eighty-three people on Ardana just now," said Fawkes. "Are they all accounted for?"

"That was what Mr. Rosh told me to do next, sir," Penner said, glancing at her console to double check. "I've just gotten pings back from everyone except..." For a second, she hesitated, as if she didn't want to believe what she had just seen. "...everyone except Lieutenant Commander Weir and Iara."

A surge of anxiety seemed to crawl up Atoz' body, making his stomach twist into a knot. On its face, that only meant that Diane and Iara hadn't been able to acknowledge the signal, but he suddenly felt his vision go gray, as if some invisible hand were constricting his throat, depriving him of air. His palms felt clammy, he wanted to rub them on his uniform shirt. His mouth was dry as he said evenly, "Run a transponder scan and locate them."

Penner's fingers darted over her console. When she was done, again she hesitated, aware of the Captain's personal feelings for Weir. And yet the young Comm officer forced herself to meet his eyes, willed her voice to remain steady. "I'm sorry, sir, there's nothing. Um... It's possible the sudden pressure drop damaged their comm badges..." Her voice trailed off, not daring to state the obvious. If Weir and Iara had been sucked out through the field breach into the stratosphere ten miles above the ground, they were surely dead.

Atoz rubbed his eyes. "Get me the Security Adviser to the Council, Ensign."

As Penner turned back to her station, there was a pause that seemed to last far too long, as the young ensign listened to a voice in her earpod. Then she turned back almost reluctantly. "Captain, that was the Security Adviser's assistant. She says the Adviser is busy, and that we would be kept apprised of any new information."

Atoz' gaze swept the bridge as everyone silently considered this statement. "Mr. Rosh, Mr. Caeli, we're beaming down. Tricorders only. This being a Federation planet, we won't take phasers. Mr. Fawkes, launch a shuttlecraft to begin searching. The planetary authorities will not appreciate the ship's sensors being used, but find out what you can."

"We'll do our best, sir."

***

Five minutes later, Atoz materialized on the public transport pad on Perim Square, with Lt. Rosh and Lt. Caeli on either side of him. He immediately saw a number of security men in yellow uniforms roaming busily about the square. They had cordoned off the fountain and a section of the balustrade, and were questioning bystanders.

The officer in charge was dressed in a loose civilian suit, the jacket of which draped in folds around his torso like a toga. He did not look at all happy to see Starfleet officers. "Captain Atoz," he said waspishly, "I had my assistant instruct you that I would keep you informed. There is no need for you to come down here and... and--"

"--ask questions, Mr. Adviser?" Atoz said calmly. "Two members of my crew are unaccounted for. I have shuttlecraft combing the area underneath the city. In the meantime, I need to see for myself how your investigation is going."

Rosh had opened his tricorder and was scanning the fountain, standing next to a uniformed investigator who was busily writing something on his tablet. The Ardanan looked up, taken aback at the sight of the Eminian's brow ridges and vestigial horns, but recovered and went on writing. Seeing him, the Adviser frowned.

"As we're informing the public, no one was in any danger," he said testily. "The explosive was a harmless pyrotechnic device. Dimagnusite residue was found. Its chemical composition is characteristic of the southern continental region where Disrupters are known to be active. We're attempting to trace it to its source now."

"Disrupters?" Atoz said.

"A dissident group," the official said. "Troglytes. Ground dwellers. We give them more rights and they're never happy. They've been responsible for violent attacks many times before." Watching irritably as Caeli walked over to the balustrade, examining a slight imperfection in the transparent aluminum flooring, he raised his voice slightly. "Eyewitnesses say that three or possibly four people were standing near the balustrade, one of them a Klingon--"

"A Cardassian," Atoz corrected.

"--But they may have left before the explosion. We're checking surveillance tapes for that possibility."

"Any idea what caused the breach in the force field?"

"Another pyrotechnic device, obviously. The field is only to keep the atmosphere contained. It's not intended as a defensive barrier. But the secondary systems cut in as they should and--"

"Did your traffic control network detect any aircraft in the vicinity?"

"Absolutely not!" the Adviser said shortly. "Now, Captain, you know everything I know. Personally I think it more than likely that your crew persons are somewhere else in the city and simply failed to check in. But I promise you I'll get to the bottom of this, if you'll only let me do my job!"

"Of course, Mr. Adviser," Atoz said pleasantly. "Forgive me for being a little bit anxious about my crew. Mr. Rosh! Mr. Caeli!" He spun on his heel and strode back across the square toward the art gallery, as the two officers hurried to take up positions on either side of him. Once they were at a safe distance, Atoz turned to Rosh. "Did you get anything?" he said quietly.

"I pirated a copy of the report the investigator was writing," the Tactical officer replied, reading from his tricorder screen. "According to this, the pyrotechnic device was of a type that is commonly available, so that tracing its source would be pointless. And the traffic control network for this area of the city was off line while the incident occurred."

Caeli, on his other side, snorted. "There wasn't any residue near the balustrade, Captain. Whatever breached the force field, it wasn't any explosive. More likely a high intensity sonic disruption."

Atoz glanced back toward the fountain. "It's safe to say the attack came from outside rather than within. Where's the nearest city on the ground?"

"There is a Troglyte city called Decopolis, twenty miles away, Captain."

Atoz tapped his comm badge. "Atoz to Odysseus. Three to beam down to the city of Decopolis."

***
Diane Weir suddenly found herself standing in a plain cubical room about three meters on each side. As adrenalin shot through her bloodstream, making her whole body feel flushed, her trembling legs gave way, dropping her into a padded bench the same dull gray color as the walls.

Iara was on her knees on the floor in front of her, gasping for breath and shaking like a leaf. Weir reached for the girl to make certain that she was all right. She was shivering from fright, just as Weir herself was, but otherwise she seemed unhurt. "What happened, Diane?" Iara whimpered. "Where are we?"

"It's all right," Weir murmured, holding the girl tight and stroking her hair as she looked around the cell. Josie had also tumbled to the floor next to Iara, the skirt of her dress in a bright golden tangle. They only had time to exchange bewildered looks as a male voice suddenly spoke.

"What's this?" he said irritably. "Why did you get all three of them?"

The man who had spoken was standing in an adjacent room on the other side of a force field door which closed off their cell. He was about medium in height, had a shock of curly white hair even though he appeared relatively young. He was expensively dressed in a neat gray suit with a flamboyant fuchsia cravat. The room he was standing in had the appearance of a workshop or laboratory, with storage lockers along the walls and in the middle a worktable with an unfamiliar electronic apparatus next to a large chair.

"As I explained to you, Mr. Pareisus," said a second man, dressed in a pale green smock, "the scanning radius of the drone is quite limited." He was a Hermian. The protruding snout and rounded, fur-covered ears of his species had unkindly been called squirrel-like, but actually they were carnivores. "If she had been alone, I could have picked her up easily, but obviously she was not alone. The distraction we created only gave us a few seconds, and you did not want to wait..."

"Yes, yes! Spare me the details, Sador."

The mention of "the drone" called Weir's attention to a torpedo shaped object about two meters long, parked to one side in the larger room. A kidnap drone? Pods equipped with a transporter relays were sometimes found in adventure holo-novels about spies or criminals... but Weir never dreamed that such things really existed!

Pareisus addressed the three women in the cell. "Which one of you is Josephina Miller?"

Before they even had time to think, he snapped impatiently, "I know you're disoriented by the transporter, but it's a simple enough question! Which one of you is the Memory Keeper?"

Josie timidly raised her hand. "I am."

"Donee, bring her out!" Pareisus ordered.

A third man standing unobtrusively in the background now came forward. He was big and tough and looked as if he routinely used his size to intimidate people. At the touch of a button to the right of the door, the force field went off with a snap, and the three women instinctively backed away as he came inside the cell.

"No!" Iara protested. "My mother is--"

"Shhh! Not now, sweetheart," Weir murmured in her ear, squeezing the girl's shoulders. She couldn't really say why, but she had the feeling that identifying herself as a Starfleet officer would not be the smartest thing to do at the moment. She did reach across and tap her comm badge, though, hoping that opening the channel would alert Amelia Penner that something was up. Disappointingly, instead of the quiet chirp that signified an open comm line, the little device let out a raspy buzz.

"Don't try to call for help," Pareisus said, almost absently. "The room is shielded. Hurry up, Donee!"

"Please... don't..." Josie whimpered as the thug brushed past Weir and grabbed her arms. Picking her up easily, he carried the woman to the chair and hoisted her up onto it, while Pareisus pushed the button which restored the force field on the cell door. The Hermian wearing the green smock stepped forward and took her ephone and purse, then together the men strapped her arms to the chair. "Please... what do want from me?"

"A fair question," Mr. Pareisus said, thrusting his hands casually into the pockets of his trousers. "I need you to tell me about a conversation you had on the seventeenth of Bethik, 2371."

Josie looked around apprehensively as the man in the smock fitted a narrow metal headband around her forehead. "That was... almost four years ago..."

"That's right," Pareisus said. "You talked with my father. He died only days later, in a skycar accident."

"Oh?" Josie said. "I... I'm so sorry for your loss..."

"I was... off planet at the time. I need to know what he said to you!"

"I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I don't..."

"Don't tell me you don't remember!" Pareisus snapped. "You're a Memory Keeper!"

"I take enhancements to temporarily boost my recall. Once the memory has been downloaded, the details slip away from me."

"I don't want to hear this!" Pareisus warned her.

"I honestly wish I could help," Josie said, "but if your father didn't give permission for it to be Kept, there's nothing I can do."

"I was afraid of this, Mr. Pareisus," the Hermian said, studying the display screen of the apparatus on the worktable. Whatever it was, it certainly didn't look to Weir like a psychotricorder. "The memory is buried. It will have to be rooted out." He cast a sidelong, almost sympathetic glance at the woman strapped to the chair. "I am afraid it will be painful for her."

The man in the suit hesitated, fingering something in his pocket. "Do it, then!"

[Atoz 77]

Decopolis was a sprawling city which had originally grown up along the banks of a meandering river, now overwhelmed and all but lost to view within a maze of monotonous square buildings. Most were low to the ground at three or four stories, though there were a few ten-story towers like fingers pointing at the sky. Atoz, Rosh and Caeli materialized inside a public transporter terminal in the heart of the city. The kiosk was manned by two grim-faced, uniformed operators, who snapped to attention and saluted Atoz.

Atoz returned the salute as the three Starfleet officers filed through the security checkpoint. A squad of armed men watched them warily from behind a roped-off area where the queue for beaming up to Stratos would have formed, but no one was waiting to beam up.

"A really cheerful welcome, sir," Caeli muttered as they exited the building..

The street outside was busy with ground car and pedestrian traffic, flowing both ways. Atoz tapped his comm badge. "Atoz to Odysseus. Anything to report?"

"Nothing from the shuttlecraft, Captain," replied Fawkes. "Sensor sweeps turned up one small anomaly. A trace micro-gauss deformation of the outer boundary of the Stratos City force field. Vespis says it could have been made by a transporter phase coil."

"A phase coil?" Atoz said. "You mean like on a shuttlecraft?"

"Only we couldn't pick up any ionization trail from an engine. That means it was smaller, more like a grav powered drone."

"A kidnap pod!" hissed Rosh.

"That was our guess as well," Fawkes said. "But ownership of flying machines is not permitted on Ardana, except by Stratos-dwellers."

"But antigravs are used for cargo lifting," Atoz said. "And Stratos uses Troglyte technicians to repair the city's antigrav flying units. Mr. Rosh, try the local city directory. Find me a workshop that would have the necessary equipment to build and service a grav pod."

"Aye-aye, sir."

"Mr. Fawkes," Atoz said thoughtfully. "How much do we know about the Disrupters?"

"According to Arachne, the Disrupters first surfaced eighty years ago as a militant group fighting for Troglyte equality. Troglytes, or ground dwellers, were considered feeble minded as a result of contamination they picked up mining raw zenite. The Federation came in and took steps to neutralize the contamination. Twelve years after that, High Adviser Droxine signed a law officially banning discrimination against Troglytes."

"I bet that's not the whole story, though," Caeli said ruefully. "We once had slaves back home on Romana Magna. Even when they were officially freed, they still got discriminated against in other ways."

"That's probably true here, too," said Fawkes. "On paper, Troglytes are freely allowed to visit Stratos, but there are quotas, restricted travel times, security checks..."

"Yes, we noticed that," Atoz interjected.

"Then ten years ago, the High Council planned to build a second floating city, called Cumulos, just for those of Troglyte birth.

"Really?" Atoz said. "I hadn't heard about that."

"The project was scrapped, sir," Fawkes said. "They had a good start on the foundation structure, even started on one of the gravitic generators, then the High Council decided it was too expensive. It was about then that the Disrupters reappeared, more militant than ever."

"What about the Security Adviser?" Atoz asked. "What did you find out about him?"

"Ellas Numrath. He got his present position four years ago, as a result of an undercover mission in which he broke up a Disrupter plot."

"What kind of plot?" Atoz asked.

"I couldn't find out any details," the First Officer replied. "Probably classified. The ringleader was named Pareisus. He killed himself before he could be taken into custody."

***

"He's wearing a black suit," Josie said, lying back in the chair with her eyes closed. The headband across her forehead glowed with a faint blueish ionic discharge as the snout-nosed Hermian studied the display screen of his machine. "He keeps looking over his shoulder, as if he thinks someone is watching him."

"Yes?" Pareisus urged. "Is he carrying a case?"

The woman frowned. "I don't... no, I don't think so. Should he be?"

"Never mind. What is he saying?"

"Just... about the artworks in the gallery. What a nice day it is. Small talk..."

"Anything about the Phoenix directive?"

"I can't... I can't remember," Josie moaned.

Pareisus made a curt gesture. The Hermian's ears twitched as he made an adjustment to the machine, and the headband glowed brighter. Josie moaned, struggling against the restraints that held her to the chair. "Try!" the young man urged. "I've got to know what he said!"

From inside the cell, Weir watched apprehensively with her arms holding tight to Iara's shoulders. The girl was squeezing her eyes shut, trembling as if she were in pain. "It hurts," she whispered. "Diane, it's hurting her."

"I... can't!" Josie gasped. "Please!"

Weir couldn't hold back any longer. "You've got to stop this!" she called through the force field door.

"Mind your own business!" Pareisus snapped.

"She takes short term memory enhancers!" Weir explained. "If this machine of yours stimulates her hypothalamus, the added stress could easily cause a subdural hemorrhage in her diencephalon! Is that what you want? To kill her?"

Pareisus turned angrily toward her, but to her surprise the Hermian cleared his throat. "You know, she may be right, Mr. Pareisus. The machine is made to extract information from unwilling subjects. But if this person routinely goes through memory downloads, the strain upon her synaptic tissues could be severe."

"Why didn't you tell me this before?"

"You did not tell me the subject was a Memory Keeper."

Pareisus wavered, turning to Weir. "Do you think you can do better?" he asked her. "Are you a doctor?"

Weir hesitated. Although her actual doctorate was in fact in astrophysics, she was somewhat conversant in brain physiology. But there was another consideration. The very fact that the men had resorted to abduction meant that whatever secret they were after was questionable at best. It may not be a good idea to help them get it. And yet to allow them to continue blundering on in this way would risk Josie's life. What was the logical thing to do?

"Yes!" she said, reaching a decision. "Let me help!"

Pareisus reached over and turned off the force field door. "Leave your communicator in the cell."

Weir took off her comm badge and set it down on the bench, then stepped out of the cell and tried to familiarize herself with the display screen of the device. It appeared to be generating an electromagnetic field that energized and focused the neurotransmitters responsible for memory. One screen showed Josie's physical parameters -- heart rate, blood pressure, electroencephalogram. She was dangerously close to a seizure.

"I'm turning this off right now," Weir said, reaching for the controls that would shut off the headband.

Pareisus grabbed her wrist. With his other hand, he pulled a small phaser pistol from the pocket of his jacket. "I must have this information," he said, pointing the weapon at Weir and looking her straight in the eyes. "Do you understand me?"

"I'll get it for you," Weir assured him, trying not to look at the phaser. "But we'll do it my way."

***
Atoz, Rosh and Caeli rode the pedestrian walkway through the commercial district of the city. Atoz noted the security cameras at each intersection and couldn't help imagining Adviser Numrath watching their every move. But it couldn't be helped. Their Starfleet uniforms were very conspicuous in any event.

"Here, Captain," said Rosh, stepping off the walkway in front of a wide, three story building. "This service center is responsible for repairs to Stratos City's antigravs. If anyone had the necessary equipment to build a flying drone, it would be here."

"Good work, Mr. Rosh," Atoz said, studying the outside of the building.

"What do we do, Captain?" asked Caeli, "walk in and ask them if they've been building illegal drones?"

Atoz couldn't suppress a wry grin at the idea. "I think we can assume that if Diane and Iara are being held captive, their comm badges have been disabled. Diane's biosigns would be almost indistinguishable from an Ardanan without a medical tricorder. But Iara's a Cardassian. How close would we have to be to pick up her biosigns?"

"Given the population density and interference factors," Rosh said, "I would say fifty or sixty meters, Captain."

"Okay then," Atoz said, thinking. Without phasers, this was going to be tricky. "Let's go create a ruckus."

The three of them entered the foyer of the building and found an empty waiting room. The only receptionist was a computer generated female image which smiled pleasantly as it asked how it could be of service. Atoz wasted no time with it. Pushing through the interior doors, he strode down a broad corridor, looking into each room as they passed as if he owned the place. Whenever anyone tried to question him, he brushed them aside, replying in Indrian, his native language. It was different enough from Federation Standard to sound satisfyingly like gibberish, especially when delivered in an imperious tone of voice by someone in a bright red Starfleet uniform.

Moving through another set of doors, they arrived at an industrial assembly line, where twenty workers were constructing standard cargo-lifting antigrav units. A supervisor briefly spoke to someone on his ephone and then walked briskly to intercept them. "I'm the shift foreman!" he said. "What can I go for you gentlemen?"

Atoz opted for a frontal assault, loosing a torrent of Indrian at him. "Don't you serve coffee in this place?" he ranted officiously, pinning the man against a bank of machinery and poking his chest with in index finger. "Where is the non-smoking section? What kind of establishment is this?" Not understanding a word of the tirade, the foreman looked helplessly toward Caeli.

"The Captain is appalled by the state of your factory," the lieutenant said sternly in Standard, keeping the foreman's attention on the two of them as Rosh, in the rear of the party, quietly scanned with his tricorder.. "He comes fifty light-years to inspect your facilities before signing the upcoming upgrade contract, and there is no sign of a nucleonic coleopteris generator anywhere!"

"Nucleonic--?" the foreman stammered, utterly bewildered. "I don't even-- what upgrade contract?"

"I bet you don't even have a rete lepidopterae, do you?" Caeli went on. "It's disgraceful!"

Atoz stole a look at Rosh, who merely shook his head. They had covered the entire building with no luck.

Just then the doors behind them burst open and four security men armed with stun-sticks came striding purposefully down the aisle between the machinery.

"We may have just worn out our welcome, gentlemen," Atoz said.

[Atoz 77]

The first two security guards rushed down the aisle, raising their stun-sticks to lay into the intruders, but Rosh and Caeli were the ship's champions at unarmed combat. The Eminian caught his attacker's wrist and spun him around in a flawless arm lock, slamming the heel of his hand into the man's kidneys and flipping him backwards across the aisle, while in the almost the same movement smoothly snatching up his fallen stun-stick just in time to parry a blow by his second attacker. Caeli had meanwhile ducked under the swinging stick of his own assailant, bringing himself into close quarters where two swift jabs into the guard's solar plexus dropped him to the floor. He then spun around with a kick that disarmed the fourth man. The two lieutenants had no trouble dealing with the second two guards.

The workers on the assembly line had stopped what they were doing as they and the foreman watched the fight curiously, uncertain what to do. When two more men on the catwalk above opened fire with electric blaster pistols, they were no longer uncertain -- they scattered! Moving fast, Atoz dove underneath the assembly line, narrowly evading energy beams as he rolled into the shelter of a heavy stamping machine.

As he sat with his back against the machinery, Rosh and Caeli appeared next to him, crawling across the thermocrete floor. "Someone has a guilty conscience, do you think?"

The Eminian nodded. "They would not be using deadly force unless we were onto something."

"Now that we've got it," the Roman remarked, "what do we do with it, Captain?"

"Diane and Iara aren't in the building," Atoz said, looking back and forth for a viable exit strategy. "I think we beat a hasty retreat."

Rosh had flicked open his tricorder. "Captain, if we follow the conveyor belt, we could cross to the storage area. There are vehicles there. It may be possible to commandeer one."

"Sounds like a good plan to me, Mr. Rosh," Atoz said. "All right, go!"

***

"Listen to me Josie." Weir spoke in a measured tone, calm and reassuring. "Close your eyes. Relax. Slow, deep breaths. Listen to my voice. There's no hurry, no pressure." Her hands soothingly caressed the woman's neck and shoulders, gliding gracefully downward along her arms to her wrists, where they removed her restraints. The big man moved to stop her, but Pareisus waved him back. The Hermian's eyes darted back and forth between the instruments.

"That's right," Weir continued, taking the woman's pulse at her wrist. "Lie back. Do you remember the Perim Museum? We met there this afternoon."

"Yes, I remember," Josie said.

"Good. Just breathe deeply. Do you remember another time, four years ago, when you met a man there?"

Josie smiled. "Yes, I remember him. He wore a dark suit. A really bright purple tie."

Pareisus stirred impatiently, but he visibly forced himself to wait.

"How did you meet him?" Weir asked.

"Funny thing, he just walked up to me and asked if it wasn't a lovely day," Josie said smiling. "Then he begged my pardon and said I dressed like an offworlder. Which is no surprise -- Stratos must get thousands of offworlder tourists. He asked me my name. I said Josephina. I thought he was hitting on me, to be honest..."

"And this man was Pareisus' father?"

A slight frown creased the woman's brow. "He must have been. He looked exactly like him." Her eyes flicked open as she looked at Pareisus as if to remind herself. "He even dressed like him."

"That's not important," their captor said suddenly. "Did he have a case with him? Did he talk about a code word?"

"Don't put any pressure on her," Weir scolded, "unless you want her to freeze up again."

"Wait a second," Josie said. "He didn't have a case, but he had a data padd. Is that good?"

"Yes!" Pareisus said eagerly. "What did he do with the padd?"

"Take your time, Josie," Weir said soothingly. "One thing at a time."

"Well... we talked about the art we had seen. He asked what my favorite painting was. I told him 'Storm at Sunset' by Ardveggius." She smiled, remembering. "He said he had never thought much of it. He thought the colors were too bold, too garish. Then he wrote something into the padd..."

"Yes? What did he do then?"

"He thanked me for such a pleasant conversation, and he left."

"He WHAT?"

"He just left. He said he had an appointment."

Pareisus stood frozen as if with shock. The Hermian simply watched him curiously. After a moment, the big guy, Donee, stirred to life. "That can't be right, boss. She's holding something back! You want me to persuade her a little bit?"

"Be quiet, you buffoon! I'm thinking!" Then their captor's face brightened as if he had finally found what he had been looking for. Quickly he snatched up a computer tablet from the table and typed something in. His grin became, if anything, even broader. "It works! Ladies and gentlemen, there's no denying it. My predecessor was a genius."

Weir frowned. "Your predecessor? You mean your father?"

"Diane, no!" Iara said suddenly, still inside the cell. "He's not! He's... he's the same man!"

If Pareisus was surprised by this outburst, he was too elated to care. "I don't know how you divined that, little girl, but you're correct. I am a clone of the original Pareisus." As he spoke, he held the computer tablet in one hand, smiling at whatever he saw displayed there as he typed in a series of commands.

"I was a leading Disrupter. After many years of work, I developed a Trojan Horse program and planted it inside Stratos City's antigrav control computer. The plan was to bring the entire city down if our demands weren't met. But there was a spy inside our organization, Ellas Numrath! Our entire group was arrested, I was killed trying to escape. I had personally set the password to activate the Trojan Horse, and I died without telling anyone. All my work was for nothing!"

"I see," Weir said slowly. "So they grew a clone, hoping you would be able to recreate his thinking."

"Correct." Pareisus nodded toward the Hermian. "Sador here did the honors. He even used something called a multi-temporal synapse recording to duplicate my predecessor's mental state at the time he died. Hopefully I would be able to hit upon the same password he did."

"And did you?"

Pareisus shook his head shortly. "I suspected there was a spy in the organization, a spy close enough that he might be able to guess any password I might come up with. So I hit upon a better idea -- to ask a total stranger for a password."

"A total stranger?" Josie said, startled. "You mean me?"

"I picked you because you were an outworlder. I talked until you said something that I myself would never have thought to use. And it works!" Grinning, he turned the computer table around so that they could see the display.

The heading said "Stratos City Antigrav System", and had a bewildering set of fifty power level status boxes. Several commands had been entered into the operational status line, but they were awaiting a final command to be activated Flashing across the bottom of the screen was an inset box with bold red lettering: "Danger! This action will terminate functions of Antigrav Support Generators 1 – 50 . Do you still wish to continue? YES/NO?"

Grinning, Pareisus raised his finger and pushed YES on the screen! The screen flashed once. "Antigrav Functions Terminated. Support Generators 1 – 50 shutting down..." The fifty power level markers began rapidly dropping toward zero.

"No!" Weir cried. "Without power to the antigravs, the city will--"

"--crash to the ground!" Pareisus gloated. "Yes, I know." He straightened his bright fuchsia tie and tucked the computer tablet under his arm as he walked calmly to the door. "Donee, put them back in their cell. I'll decide what to do with them later. Right now I'm going up to my office where I can watch the fireworks."

[Atoz 77]

"Mr. Fawkes?" said Ensign Nickel, the substitute helmsman, in a puzzled voice. "I'm getting strange readings from Stratos City. The antigravs seem to be failing."

"What?" said the First Officer, leaning against the railing by the Sciences station. "You must be mistaken."

Nickel quickly checked the console again. "Stratos City is losing altitude, sir! Seven hundred meters already!"

"Tractor beam, Blackadar!" Fawkes snapped, crossing the bridge in three swift strides to the helm console.

"Tractor beams aye," confirmed the Scot, activating the controls to send three beams to equidistant points in the city's superstructure. She had to be very careful about this. If she didn't latch precisely onto the structure's center of gravity, the city would tip over like a twenty million tonne pancake and plow into the planet edge on. Tractor one collapsed from the strain. Blackadar's fingers flew over the controls as she rapidly repositioned it. "It's too far down in the gravity well, Mr. Fawkes," she said at last, still making adjustments. "I canna hold it."

"Engage impulse engines," Fawkes ordered the helmsman as he tapped his comm badge. "Engineering! Transfer emergency warp power to the tractor beams! Brace up the structural integrity!"

The Red Alert siren began to squall its raucous chorus as the bridge lights dimmed. Fawkes kept his eyes on the helm console's sensor display, watching and waiting. The huge structure was still falling. A thousand meters already... eleven hundred, a twelve hundred... were they slowing it at all?

"Stabilized at nine miles altitude, Mr. Fawkes," Lt. Blackadar reported. "But it's taking every bit of power we've got! We canna hold it for long!"

***

The big Troglyte hooked his hand around Josie's right arm and pulled her out of the chair. "Come on, ladies," he said as he grabbed Weir's left arm, pushing both women towards the cell. "Don't try anything cute. I don't want to have to hurt you." Behind him, the Hermian snorted in a disgruntled way as he began packing up his equipment.

Weir put up a halfhearted struggle, but the man was much too strong. Josie went along without resisting. Inside the cell, Iara watched apprehensively as they approached the door, her dark eyes locked on the Science Officer's. Get ready, sweetheart, Weir said silently in her mind. When you see your chance, I want you to run and don't look back, understand me? Use your comm badge to call for help.

Almost imperceptibly the Cardassian girl nodded.

"That's right, don't give me any trouble," the Troglyte grumbled, as he let go of Josie just long enough to touch the button which deactivated the force field door of the cell.

At that moment, Weir raked her foot down the big man's shin and stomped on his foot. She had hoped the surprise alone would make him let go of her, but he only tightened his grip. "Why you little--!"

Without hesitation, Weir brought her knee up into his stomach, at the same time punching at his face with her free arm. The Troglyte caught her wrist and held her as she struggled like a wildcat in his grip. Josie balked for a second then jumped on the man's broad back, locking her arms around his neck. Iara seized upon the distraction to dart out of her cell.

"Hey, stop!" said the Hermian, looking up from his work. But the Cardassian girl was already through the lab door, running.

***

"Engineering to Bridge!" said the Chief Engineer's voice over Fawkes' comm badge. "What in Zarkhon's name are you thinking? That city's the size of a small asteroid! We can't hold it forever!"

"We can't let it fall either, Vespis," Fawkes replied. "There are almost a million people in that city. Give me another option!"

"Mr. Fawkes," said Penner at communications, "I've got Iara's comm badge! Her coordinates are in Decopolis!"

"Beam her up," the First Officer said distractedly.

"Sorry, Papa," said Vespis' voice over the intercom. "I had to take the Transporters off line. Hey, you want tractor beams or not? That's taking everything but the replicators in the ship's galley!"

Fawkes ran a hand through his close-cropped hair. "Send her coordinates to the Captain," he told Penner. "Maybe he can find her."

***
Iara sprinted down a narrow corridor, turned a corner and found herself in some kind of lobby where two hallways crossed one another, one alcove leading to a staircase. Which way? The stairs! The man had said he was going up to his office! The girl pattered up the staircase, tapping at the comm badge on the front of her tunic. "Odysseus! Help!"

The badge chirped, then she heard the reassuring sound of Ensign Penner's voice. "Iara? Are you all right? Where are you?"

"Aunt Amelia! You've got to stop him! He's going to destroy the city!"

"What? Who's going to destroy the city?"

"No time!" Iara gasped, clutching a stitch in her side as she reached the top of the stairs and burst through the door. She found herself in another L-shaped corridor which led through a small office with a woman sitting at a computer console. The woman looked up but didn't make any move to stop the Cardassian girl as she raced past, barreled through a sliding pocket door and came to stop inside a much larger office.

"What are you doing here?" said Pareisus. He was standing beside a big desk made out of some dark exotic wood. The office was decorated with bookshelves and fake potted plants. To the right was the door of a private lift. But the most noticeable thing was the gigantic flexglass windows which took up most of one curving wall, giving a panoramic view of the city of Decopolis. Off in the distance, the cloud city of Stratos could be seen hanging high in the sky like a dark cloud, casting a monstrous shadow underneath it.

"I... um..." Iara really didn't know. She had made it this far on pure adrenalin. Diane had told her to run, but not where to run to. Nervously she eyed the tablet which he had left lying on the desktop.

Pareisus reached into the pocket of his jacket and withdrew his phaser. With the other hand, he indicated a chair. "Sit down. We can watch the destruction together. The culmination of my life's work!"

Iara inched over to the chair, wondering what she could do.

Suddenly the lift doors hissed open and Captain Atoz and Lieutenant Caeli charged out into the office. Pareisus raised his phaser, but Iara slammed her small body into his abdomen, knocking his aim off. As the deadly phaser beam plowed into a potted plant, disintegrating it into dust, the Troglyte pushed her angrily aside and tried to recover.

Atoz tackled him, desperate to get the phaser away from him. There was a brief, frantic flailing of arms as he caught Pareisus' wrist and together they lurched hard into the flexglass picture window.

"You can't stop me!" the Troglyte groaned as he fought back. "My... life's... work!"

The phaser dropped to the carpet, giving Atoz the opening he needed to throw his fist into Pareisus' jaw with a satisfying crunch. Caeli joined the scuffle, but the Troglyte was already sagging to the floor.

"Captain! The computer!" Iara cried, rushing to the tablet lying open on the desk.

The display was still showing Antigrav Systems, the status boxes almost reading zero. Atoz quickly typed in a series of Reset commands, but nothing happened. "We need the password!"

"Storm at Sunset!" Iara blurted.

Atoz wanted to ask how she knew, but there was no time to question her, only to gamble that she was right. He typed in the phrase as a single word. The screen flashed once, and to his relief the status boxes began to climb back up to full power. "Antigrav System Reset. Power to Support Generators 1 – 50 restored."

"Does that mean the city's not going to fall?" the girl asked.

"Yes, I think it does," Atoz said with a heartfelt sigh. "Where's Diane?"

"Er... she's down--"

"Here I am, sir," said Weir, emerging from the lift with Josie and Lt. Rosh. Iara rushed over to hug her.

"Are you all right?" Atoz asked.

"We're fine, sir."

"The same might not be said," Rosh added, "for a Troglyte and a Hermian who were holding them prisoner, sir. They did not want to go quietly into the cell." He rubbed his fist. "A certain amount of persuasion was necessary."

"A Hermian?" Atoz said. "Obviously there was more to this than meets the eye."

Weir stood up straight, draping her arms around Iara's shoulders. "Actually, sir, it was just a case of a man who went to extraordinary lengths because he couldn't accept his own failure."

>>>> THE END