Disclaimer: All things Star Trek belong to Voyager. I’m just taking a few of the characters for a little outing.

Summary: Janeway struggles to get her hands on the evidence she needs to convince Starfleet that Chakotay is innocent, while her enemies take steps to eliminate the problem (and the people causing the problem) once and for all.

Note: This story begins 2 months after Line Camp.

Gathering Storm (A Belle Colony Story)

by mizvoy

“I was better off ‘dead.'” Kathryn Janeway stood looking out of Admiral Paris’s office window, her hands gripped behind her back as she struggled to keep her temper. “Here it is November, and not a damned thing has changed.”

“Now, Kathryn. It isn’t as bad as that. The admiralty has taken your report about Anorha under advisement, that’s all. They aren’t finished with it.”

“It’s been two months, sir.”

“And they’ve admitted that Belle Colony was researching ways to defend against phased cloaks. That’s a start. They’ve even implied that it was staffed by alien personnel.”

“‘Implied’? Frankly, sir, that isn’t good enough.” She turned to face him, her eyes blazing. “They were building and testing the cloak there, sir, not researching ‘how to defend against it.’ The woman who told me the truth about Belle Colony betrayed her country to do so. There’s more at stake here than either of us realizes.”

“Some things can’t be made public, Kathryn. Surely you understand that.”

“What harm would be done by admitting that no one died in the dome’s implosion?”

Admiral Paris sighed. “It could be a public relations disaster, Kathryn. Think about it. Announcing that there were no deaths would be the same as admitting that they lied.”

“It would be the truth! They did lie!”

“There was biomatter in the debris, Kathryn. Have you forgotten that?”

“I’ve heard that before, sir, and, pardon the language, bullshit.” She walked to his desk and put her hands on the surface, leaning toward him until they were practically nose-to-nose. “Nobody even bothered to take a sample of that biomatter for analysis after the accident, and now, the atmosphere has destroyed whatever was there. The ‘biomatter’ they detected from space could easily have been fruits and vegetables, or replicated as part of the cover-up.”

He leaned back in his chair, away from her. “Why would anyone go to that much trouble?”

“To hide an illegal research facility?” She let that thought sink in and stood up. “Besides, we know there was no biomatter, because Anorha had told us that the colony had been evacuated.”

“Kathryn, sit down and relax, won’t you? I’m convinced.” He gestured at the chair in front of his desk, anxious to get his former student to calm down and listen to reason. “Starfleet needs time. Remember that they didn’t have the chance to meet Anorha or cross-examine her.”

“I cross-examined her, Owen, and it’s all recorded for them to see. What would she have to gain from telling a lie?” Janeway sat down heavily in the chair. “She was hours away from death when she made that recording. It was practically a death-bed confession.”

He gave her an indulgent smile, trying to smooth her ruffled feathers. “What you’ve proposed is just too much for some admirals to accept without more proof. A conspiracy? From inside Starfleet?”

She glared at him. “Even the truest believer admits that Section 31 exists, sir. This is just the kind of illegal activity Section 31 would pursue. Remember, Anorha stated that three of those cloaked ships were supposed to be delivered to the Federation.”

“An allegation that only serves to undermine everything else she said, Kathryn.” Paris laughed at the suggestion. “The idea is preposterous.”

She rubbed her forehead with the tips of her fingers. “The scientists on Belle Colony were Utavi, Owen, who were evacuated and returned to their own territory so they could continue the cloaking research unimpeded by Federation law. I’m sure they did so with the blessing of whoever was their partner here.”

“And they were to repay these covert partners with cloaked ships?” Admiral Paris shook his head. “They’re highly illegal, and you know it.”

“That’s the point! Don’t you see? The Utavi finally figured out that their partners couldn’t admit to being involved in the research, much less to building illegal ships. What could Section 31 do if the Utavi decided not to hold up their side of the bargain and kept all six ships? Nothing! They couldn’t even protest, because they couldn’t admit to being involved. So, why not keep all the ships for themselves? Why not get rid of an enemy and a useless partner all in one quick battle?”

Paris paused, thinking about her proposal before he shrugged it off. “Starfleet would never commission the building of ships with phased cloaks, Kathryn, either inside the Federation or outside of it. It’s too explosive an issue, especially with things so dicey with the Romulans just now.”

“Not Starfleet, Owen. Section 31.” Kathryn stopped to think about the Enterprise, still under repair following its near-destruction following Shinzon’s coup and subsequent vendetta against Picard. She knew that their enemies were still reeling from the loss of their entire Senate and that their energies were focused inward, toward restoring their government. “I’d think the Romulans are too busy to gripe about anything at the moment.”

“They would jump on something like this illegal research, Kathryn, as a way to excuse their own behavior.”

She drew circles on the arm of her chair, suddenly thoughtful. “How do these admirals explain the Pegasus? Members of Starfleet were testing a phased cloak on that ship, weren’t they? Isn’t it curious that my informer used that particular code name when she first contacted me?”

“I admit that it’s a remarkable coincidence, but the Pegasus fiasco was years ago. I’m not willing to believe this was a conspiracy simply because someone used the same name.”

She stared at him in frustration. “Yet, we knew phased cloaks were being developed by the Romulans, and we had to be worried about that. I know about the Romulan ship that very nearly destroyed itself during testing.”

“That’s classified.” He narrowed his eyes at her. “And it’s research they’ve put aside.”

“But someone is going to eventually have it, Sir. How better to ‘test our defenses’ against them than by building ships and then using our tactics in real maneuvers?”

“I admit that some people might use that line of reasoning as an excuse, but I also doubt that it happened. The attack on Hyperion was a result of Ambassador Tydkt’s miscalculations, Kathryn, nothing more. He allowed himself to become too entangled in the on-going war between the Utavi and the Toroyans, and then he was caught in the middle when it came to a head.” His demeanor softened. “What’s really behind all this is your desire to clear Chakotay’s name. Am I right?”

“I wish it were that simple.” She rested her head on her fist and gave him a mournful look. “There’s so much more at stake than that.”

“You think Section 31 still exists, don’t you?”

She nodded and sat back in her chair with a sigh. “I’m afraid it does, at least part of it, and I think they’ll do anything to keep from being discovered and stopped. They’re used to breaking laws with impunity, sir. They want to keep on doing so.”

“Including trying to harm someone inside Starfleet?” He shook his head indulgently. “You’ve been through too much, and now you’re seeing threats that don’t exist.”

“I’m not paranoid, Owen, if that’s what you’re thinking. It’s not wrong to fear a group that’s willing to kill people without a second thought.”

“Section 31 was eliminated after the Dominion War, Kathryn, and there’s nothing to make anyone think that they still exist.”

“Can anyone really be sure of that, Owen?”

“I suggest you just put Belle Colony behind you and get on with your life. Despite the rumors I hear now and then, Chakotay hasn’t been seen or heard from in months.”

Her head snapped up. “Rumors?”

Paris frowned in exasperation. “See how emotionally you react just at the mention of his name? I wish you would just forget about him.”

“What are the rumors about Chakotay?” she demanded.

“Many of the admirals think you’re hiding information, not coming forth with everything that happened after the attack.” Paris toyed with a data chip, deep in thought. “They feel that your report is incomplete.”

“Incomplete?” She took a calming breath. If what he said was true, they had nothing concrete to base their suspicions upon. Everyone still believed that Chakotay was dead and gone and were only curious about her delay in returning to the Federation.

“You were gone for a long time, yet your report simply claims you were recovering.”

“It’s the truth. The Toroyans turned us over to the Caritas who took care of us until we were well enough to come home.” She waited, but Paris simply stared at her.

“For six weeks.”

“That’s right. I very nearly died from the fever I caught, and even after six weeks, Kazuo’s health was almost too fragile for travel.” She looked him squarely in the eye. “I returned at the earliest opportunity.”

“But you didn’t report in, even though we were teetering on the brink of war.”

“For a long time,I was too sick tothink aboutit. Afterward?” She shrugged. “I was hiding from people who’d tried to assassinate me, sir. Until I could actually come home, I decided not to put the people who were caring for me in danger of being caught in a second attempt.”

“So you say. I’m just trying to help you see things from a different perspective.” There were a few moments of uncomfortable silence. “Some in the admiralty think that you’ve never really accepted Starfleet discipline since your years in the Delta quadrant. Your fixation on Chakotay is a sign of that, as far as they’re concerned. They blame his Maquis rebelliousness for bringing this predicament on himself, and they don’t think you owe him a thing.”

She lowered her head and shielded her eyes from him by rubbing her forehead with her hand, resisting the urge to rage at all of them for their insensitive attitudes. No one understood the bond that had formed between Voyager’s command team during their long years of exile, especially since no one had ever seen them together. “I owe him everything, Owen.”

“Katie, Katie. He’s been gone almost three years. It’s time to put some closure on this and move on. Don’t you think?”

She longed to tell him that she’d been with Chakotay just two months earlier and that her commitment to him was stronger than it had ever been before. He was constantly on her mind, even showing up in her dreams, and she was counting the days until they could be together again for good. The six month wait they’d agreed to felt more like six years, and she was anxious to move on since Starfleet seemed uninterested in addressing the problem.

She gave him a wistful smile. “Owen, I’m afraid we’ll have to agree to disagree on this. It’s a matter of principle with me, an obligation that comes from his many years of support on Voyager. He’s not guilty, and I’m not going to give up until I clear his name. I owe him that much, and so much more.” She stood up and stretched, surprised at the late hour and frustrated by her former mentor’s failure to understand her. “I think I’ll call it a night.”

“All right, Kathryn. I hope you don’t take anything I’ve said personally. I’m just trying to help you understand the mentality of the admiralty on this Belle Colony issue.”

“With all due respect, I think I understand it better than you do, sir.” She smiled when she saw the look of apprehension on his face. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“You know I’m on your side, Kathryn. Always.”

“Of course, sir.”

She walked toward the transport station lost in thought. For the first time since this fiasco had begun, she wondered what she would do if Chakotay wasn’t cleared of the murder charges. Would she take whatever steps were necessary to reveal that the remnants of Section 31 still existed? Would she put her life on the line in order to make Starfleet accept their responsibilities and own up to their mistakes? Did she love him enough to leave her family, Starfleet, and the Federation behind in order to be with him?

She honestly couldn’t answer those questions yet. But, she could start looking into her alternatives a little more seriously. She reached up and touched her commbadge.

“Janeway to Tuvok. Are you still in your office?”

Ramon Cabrera realized that he was being followed as soon as he looked over the roomful of passengers at the transport station and saw a familiar face on the far side of the room. He’d seen the same fellow on his arrival the previous week, again at the computer center the next morning, and twice in the market over the weekend.
While it was fairly common to come across the same people while traveling, it was against all odds that a person would arrive on the same flight, spend six days in the same city, and then leave for the same destination after spending a short week on the planet. Not only was the man here, waiting to take the same flight to a backwater planet in the Vulcan sector, but he could never quite make eye contact with him. All of it added up to something that made Cabrera’s skin crawl.

Cabrera slumped in the chair and feigned sleep so he could look at the man through half-closed eyes. He saw a tall humanoid male, dark headed with an olive complexion, wearing a leather jacket and muddy boots. Over his shoulder, he carried a bag that was much too small for a man who was traveling such distances, and while he seemed to be engrossed by something on a small PADD he cradled in his hands, he frequently scanned the room as if looking for someone.

He also noticed a bulge at the man’s belt where a phaser would be holstered. Only security officers were authorized to carry weapons on public transports, and the only reason he would be traveling undercover would be to provide protection for a distinguished traveler or to follow a suspect without being noticed. Cabrera wanted to tell himself that he was being paranoid, but deep down he knew better. There were no celebrities in the waiting room. The man was following him.

He sat up, pretending to awaken, and yawned widely stretching his arms in the air. He offered his seat to a pregnant woman who was standing nearby, picked up his bag and headed toward the hallway that led to the men’s room as well as a storage room that had a separate exit from the transport station. He wanted his shadow to think he was using the facilities when he was actually affecting an escape. He noticed that the man looked up in alarm and hastily gathered his belongings as he approached the hallway. His intuition had been right-he was being followed all right

He walked into the short hallway only to have his progress impeded by a man shepherding two small boys out of the bathroom. Groaning with exasperation, he smiled with pretended tolerance at the delay, and then stepped into the darkened storeroom where he leaned against the door in relief as his eyes adjusted to the sudden darkness. He crossed the room by using the bar of light beneath the exit door as a guide, opened the door quietly, and slipped through it into the shadows of early evening.

The door hadn’t even closed completely when a man’s arm encircled his neck and a phaser was shoved into his ribs. He groaned in dismay, realizing that his “tail” had come directly to the exterior door to wait for him. “I was hoping you’d try to sneak out through the storeroom,” the man said, his voice oozing with amusement. “You’ve made this so much easier.”

A tall blonde woman stepped out of the shadows. Her voice tinged with an eastern European accent as she said, “Don’t you know how dangerous it is to travel alone, Roberto? That is the name you’re using these days, right?”

Cabrera stared at her, no longer struggling against his assailant’s hold. He recognized her voice. “Sveta?”

“Let him loose,” she commanded, and the arm around his neck was withdrawn. “No more of this ridiculous behavior, Roberto. You have an appointment, and, by God, we’re going to make sure you keep it. Now, if the two of you hurry, you can still make the flight.”

His attacker handed the woman the phaser and steered the stunned Cabrera ahead of him through the storeroom and back down the short hallway. Before they emerged into the waiting room, he said, “Call me Mike. I’m an old friend you just happened to run into and decided to travel with for awhile. And be assured, in case you get any other big ideas, that I’m not alone. Do you want the window or aisle seat?”

“Window, I guess.” Cabrera walked back to the waiting room beside the man who had just become his traveling companion, and he realized that his pursuers were not trying to stop him. They were interested in using him as bait for bigger fish. “Who are you? What’s this about?”

“Who we are doesn’t matter, Roberto. And what it’s about is loyalty.” His tone made it clear that the discussion was over. They entered the waiting room and found a couple of seats. Mike turned to him with a friendly smile and began a charade that would develop into a real friendship in the next few weeks. “So, my friend, Roberto, what a pleasant surprise to find a traveling companion! Tell me what you’ve been doing since the last time I saw you.”

Tuvok watched his former captain grow visibly angry as she looked over the series of mysterious communiqués he’d received over the last ten weeks. Each message contained a puzzle that pointed to Tevlik’s moon, the location where most of the Maquis had been brutally murdered by the Cardassians during the Dominion War. They also suggested a stardate that was about six weeks in the future. Once she finished reading them, Janeway looked up at the Vulcan with exasperation in her eyes.
“You’ve been getting these secret messages for over two months and you’re just now bringing them to my attention? Didn’t you think I might need to know about them?”

“I wanted to do some research, so that I could give you some idea of their point of origin. I thought they could be someone’s idea of a joke.”

“And?” She straightened up, putting one hand on her hip. “What did you find out?”

“Whoever has sent these has been very clever in masking his or her whereabouts. I had to enlist the help of Seven of Nine to trace their points of origin, and even then we could only determine a sector, not a specific location.” He took the PADD from her, entered some commands, and handed it back. “As you can see, the individual has hardly taken a direct path to the Tevlik system.”

She gasped as she looked at the star chart. “The first message comes from near Starbase 450-close to the border where the Caritas operate.”

“Indeed.” He paused as she returned to the chart. “I immediately thought of some of the loosely organized groups that have escaped prosecution there. You’re aware that the refugees who call themselves the Sestwani include many former Federation citizens.”

“You mean the surviving Maquis and others sympathetic to their cause.” She glanced up at him. Chakotay had told her about a Sestwani woman named Alita who had been in the Maquis and who had managed to keep him informed about events inside the Federation. “I didn’t think there were many still around. You’re thinking that the person who sent you these messages might have been hiding with the Sestwani?”

“It would be a logical assumption. Who else would start toward Tevlik from this particular location?”

She nodded. “The bad thing is that it’s right in the middle of the Badlands.” She returned the PADD to him and made her way to the sofa in her sparse quarters, taking a seat and leaning her head back against the cushions until she was staring at the ceiling, lost in thought. She had a vague tickle of a memory trying to surface, and she knew that relaxing and letting her mind drift would help bring it to the surface. Suddenly she lifted her head to look at the Vulcan. “Cabrera. Maybe he was living with the Sestwani.”

“Should I recognize that name?”

She quickly explained how she had met with Ramon Cabrera, Coquille’s sole survivor, when her transport beam from San Francisco had been misdirected and she’d reappeared hours later in Australia. “He said the Coquille was chasing a Maquis vessel in the Badlands when it was destroyed by a plasma storm. He survived in an escape pod and then spent the rest of the war in a refugee camp. But he never told me who retrieved the pod or what refuge camp he lived in.” She grew thoughtful. “It had to be the Maquis who rescued him, and I’d assumed the camp was Bajoran. But now I’m thinking that he might have ended up in a Sestwani camp.”

Predictably, Tuvok was more troubled by her brief kidnapping than he was interested in who might have been responsible for Cabrera’s rescue. He listened impassively to her description of her “misdirected transport,” but in reality he was furious with her. “Admiral, I’m distressed that you didn’t tell me of this ‘kidnapping’ right away. You have no way of knowing whether this Cabrera was really a member of the Coquille’s crew, nor do you know whether he’s telling you the truth about what he scanned. If nothing else, he’s a deserter who has yet to bring what he knows to the attention of the authorities. You’re failure to report this is not only risky, it could result in disciplinary action against you for . . . .”

“Tuvok,” she interrupted him, shaking her head in dismay. “Stop being an ‘officer of the court’ for a minute and help me think this through. Whoever he was, he tried to warn me of the potential dangers I’d face while working with Ambassador Tydkt, and he was right. Before you get on your soapbox, I didn’t tell you about Cabrera because that would have put you in danger, too.”

Tuvok narrowed his eyes as he carefully repressed the anger that boiled within him. “Admiral, I don’t believe that this Cabrera sneaked onto Earth and ‘misdirected’ your transport beam without detection. He admitted that he used Section 31’s own equipment. Isn’t it possible that he’s working for them?” He waited for her reaction and sighed when she shrugged, instead. “We both know that someone inside Starfleet aided Chakotay in his flight from prosecution. How do you know that Cabrera wasn’t part of that scheme, as well?”

She rubbed her forehead with her hand. “I don’t know for sure, of course. I haven’t dared look into the records to confirm what he told me about Coquille. If what he’s said is true, looking into it would probably set off even more alarms.”

“I read them, and there was no mention of Coquille in any of the Belle Colony reports.”

“In light of what he told me, does that surprise you?” She held up a hand to stop him from arguing. “I know. That doesn’t prove that the Coquille was censored from the reports, because we don’t know that the Coquille was there, at all. It’s in his favor that Cabrera was trying to keep me from doing something rash.”

“I could have told him he was wasting his time,” he agreed. “Which brings us back to these coded messages. They imply a meeting at this time and place.”

She nodded. “We’ll be there, of course.”

He shook his head emphatically. “I’ll be there, Admiral. I should meet this individual alone.”

She leaned forward and glared at him. “I’m going with you.”

“I think that would be a mistake.”

“I would hate to ask your superiors why you didn’t report Ramon Cabrera and my misdirected transport to Starfleet when it happened.”

Tuvok seemed stunned at her threat. “I could simply explain that I just found about it!”

“They’ll believe that, of course.” She rolled her eyes. “When I report these mysterious coded messages you’ve been hiding for the last two months, how will they react? They might decide you’re as much to blame for hiding this information as I am.” She smiled at his wounded look and put a reassuring hand on his arm. “You need a ship and a minimal crew, and you need to get them without answering a lot of questions. Where else would you go for that but me?”

“I can see that I am, indeed, implicated in this scheme of yours in spite of myself.” His eyebrow lifted nearly to his hairline. “Obviously my initial error was in associating with you at all, Admiral.”

Janeway laughed heartily and gave his arm a squeeze. “Tuvok, after all these years, it’s about time you figured that out!”

The cold, damp caves of Tevlik Moon were dark except for the light that filtered through holes created by the Cardassian ships’ orbital phasers. Little evidence remained of the bustling Maquis camp that had thrived in the caves many years earlier, little, that is, except piles of useless junk and a marker commemorating the dead. The Cardassians had been both efficient and deadly in their elimination of every single Maquis living there, whether male or female, adult or child. Any usable equipment or vessel that they didn’t take for their own use was left behind, damaged beyond repair. Their vengeance had been vicious and complete, but then they’d moved on to greener pastures, focusing on the Federation and their allies and leaving the bodies of the dead scattered where they had fallen.
When news of the massacre had been confirmed, a team of Starfleet personnel made their way to the moon to bury the dead and investigate rumors about a Coquille survivor who had been rescued by the Maquis and had been killed at the caves. Two men from the group, men who were members of the secretive Section 31, had remained behind and had spent weeks painstakingly sifting through the rubble, hoping to determine whether any of it came from the Coquille. Every nook and cranny of the caves had been mapped and scanned, but the end result of their efforts was encouraging and frustrating. They had been able to confirm that a few pieces of the debris came from the Coquille, but they couldn’t find enough to support the allegation that an escape pod had been housed there.

The mystery of the events had survived. Had the Maquis recovered a survivor who could testify to the real events at Belle Colony? Did he or she have information on the Belle Colony explosion that might have been hidden on the Coquille? Was this information hidden somewhere in the caves? Or on the moon? Or even on the planet itself? There was no way to tell, and so the team had hedged their bets. If any data was there, chances were good that someday the survivor would return to retrieve it, and so a series of monitoring devices were carefully placed in the caves, on the moon’s surface, and even on Tevlik itself to notify Section 31when and if anyone returned to the blasted Maquis base. And, in case the retrieval happened too quickly for direct intervention, a series of bombs were placed there as well.

Lieutenant Commander Duane Chandler sat on the porch of a cabin in the forest preserve north of San Francisco watching the December mist filter its way through the trees. His family was scheduled to join him later in the day for a long weekend of relaxation, so he’d left work early so that he could get the cabin ready for their arrival. At least, that’s what he’d told his staff at Starfleet Intelligence. But the truth was that he was also here for a covert meeting with another member of Section 31 regarding a critical situation.
Chandler heard rather than saw a solitary man beam onto the pathway a few hundred yards inside the forest. The trail that was popular with many Academy professors and cadets who used it for much needed fresh air and exercise, but this man had an ulterior motive. As soon as he materialized, he walked to the cabin where Chandler sat waiting for him.

“Chandler,” he said as he stepped onto the porch and took a seat.

“Kagan.” Chandler nodded at a PADD on the table between them. “The transmissions have stopped, but not before we were able to detect a pattern in them.” The new arrival pushed his coat’s hood off of his head and studied the data while Chandler watched him intently, narrowing his eyes when he saw the man react with shock at what he read.

Kagan’s voice wavered. “The Tevlik moon.”

“Surely you aren’t surprised? It’s a location that carries great meaning for these people.”

“I’d hoped I’d never have to go back there.” He glanced at the other man and then looked away, embarrassed by his emotional reaction.

Chandler wasn’t surprised, however. Kagan had been Sloan’s special pet, especially groomed to do the dirty work for Section 31 from his first days in the organization, and he’d done well until they’d been sent to do the cleanup of the massacre of the Maquis on Tevlik Moon. Chandler was also haunted by the memories of the families they’d buried, including tiny infants and children, but he was sure that Kagan must have something in his past that made the process even more difficult. The cracks in Kagan’s composure had started on Tevlik moon, but had become even more problematic during the Dominion War.

If Chandler had any other choice, he would never expose Kagan to this environment again. But, Kagan was the only other agent who was aware of what had happened following the Belle Colony disaster, and Chandler felt that he had no choice but to use him. It was important to limit the contamination of the project, and so he hoped Kagan would remain stable until they found a brought it to a final resolution.

“I know it’s tough, Kagan” he sympathized, deciding to acknowledge the man’s reluctance. “It’s tough on all of us who went through that cleanup. I’m not exactly thrilled by the prospect of returning to the moon, either, but the repeated date in January has got to be a rendezvous, and we have to be there to make sure the damage is contained.”

“You said that the transmissions have stopped?” Kagan’s voice was hopeful. “Couldn’t that mean that the rendezvous won’t happen?”

“I think it more likely means that the message was received, and so no further messages were required. After all, they’d sent six transmissions, exactly two weeks apart. Besides, we can’t take the risk. We have to be there.”

Kagan finally looked at him, the dread clearly visible in his expression. “Is there any way to tell where the messages originated?”

“Believe me, we’ve tried, but they’re impossible to trace.”

Kagan snorted. “You must be kidding. To do that, they’d have to subvert our tracking system.” He stiffened as he realized what he’d said and remembered the one person who’d been amazingly successful in doing just that-using Section 31’s own technology against them. “Not Cabrera?”

“Who else but Cabrera? But he’s on the move, and, to make it worse, each transmission arrived on a carrier wave in Tuvok’s private mail.”

“Why Tuvok? Why not the admiral’s mail?”

“I asked the same question. All I can think of is that Cabrera, like the rest of us, must have thought Janeway was dead. The date of the first message is a couple of weeks before her miraculous reappearance.”

“Makes sense.” The rain had become more intense, and the temperature had dropped significantly, but Kagan knew their meeting would not move indoors nor would he fail to make his hike. If anyone noticed him, he could simply say he’d waited out the worst of the rain on the porch. There could be no connection made between himself and Chandler. “So, if the Maquis took Cabrera to the moon base after the Coquille was destroyed, he might have hidden the scans there and intend to give them to Tuvok?”

“Kagan, we both know the data wasn’t on the moon. We went through those caves inch by inch. I’m thinking he must be bringing the data with him.”

“Maybe.” Kagan shivered as the breeze picked up. “We should’ve tracked him down after Coquille was destroyed, as soon as we heard rumors that there had been a survivor.”

“Hindsight is 20/20.” Chandler picked up a scanner and checked the vicinity for strangers, making sure they weren’t being observed. “You forget how thin we were spread back in ’74.”

“Not as thin as we are now.”

“Well, no. But the climate will change. When a new threat to the Federation appears, the tolerance for Section 31 will return in full force. Fear does that to people.” He put the scanner down with a sigh, thinking of the inadequate resources they had to use, even for something as critical as this meeting. He’d be lucky to acquire a shuttle and a second ship to take care of the situation. They would have to plan the confrontation carefully, making maximum use of the element of surprise.

Kagan’s face darkened with worry. “The war was a terrible time. We couldn’t take the time to find Cabrera because we were trying to stay alive ourselves.”

“You know, I’ve been thinking. If Cabrera has a copy of the Colony scans, why would he hide for ten years without making a move to reveal what he knows? We left him alone because we were convinced that he didn’t have any proof.”

Kagan frowned. “I always thought he had proof. They found three copies of his covert scans hidden on the Coquille, and I thought the chances were good that they missed one.”

“And that’s why we kept Coquille out there.”

“In harm’s way,” Kagan muttered, obviously unhappy.

“The ship wasn’t left out there to be destroyed, Kagan. We were hoping it would be damaged enough to justify impounding it for a more complete search.”

“Sure. You can say that now.” Kagan ran a hand over his face. “But we both know that the easier solution was to have the ship and crew destroyed in the line of duty.”

“Well, don’t feel guilty about it, Kagan. It wasn’t your decision, anyway.”

He shrugged, sinking back in the chair. “The crew was always going to be a liability to the security of the cloak project. If they’d lived, they would probably have been followed, maybe even drummed out of the service.”

“You have a point,” Chandler agreed. “And, if the crew had been allowed to contact home, their families would be just as much of a liability as anyone else.” He grew thoughtful. “I wonder if the Maquis knew that Cabrera was a threat to their safety when they rescued him.”

“If they didn’t know, Cabrera did. We should’ve thought of the Sestwani refugee camps. A small team could have worked through those quickly.”

“The Sestwani were way out of our sphere of influence at the time, Kagan. Why would we even think of them?” He shook his head in despair. “The real shame is that he wasn’t still on the moon when the Cardies found out where the Maquis camp was hidden. If he’d been killed with the rest of them, our problems would be over.”

“What did you say? ‘When the Cardies found out?’ Chandler, you know as well as I do that Sloan told them where the base was located.”

“That’s only rumor,” he disagreed, thinking that a man with a conscience like Kagan’s should never serve in Section 31. “There are so many ‘ifs’ to this whole mess. ‘If’ Coquille’s captain had followed orders and chased the Maquis instead of going to help the colonists. ‘If’ Chakotay had been killed during his exile to the Delta Quadrant. ‘If’ any admiral but Janeway had been caught up in this intrigue. ‘If’ the Union had focused on eliminating Janeway as we’d asked them to do instead of trying to assassinate the Toroyan leadership at the same time.”

Kagan shook his head. “Bad luck, pure and simple. So we’re going to be on the moon in January.”

“Of course,” Chandler replied, standing up and stretching, his joints stiff from the damp cold. “If we plan things right, I think we can take care of it ourselves. Chakotay is dead, so if we can get Cabrera, we’ll be safe at last.”

“Any chance that the admiral will be there, too?” Kagan wondered, suddenly hopeful that this awful muddle was almost over.

“I’d be surprised if she didn’t come.” He thought about the meeting. Cabrera. Janeway. Tuvok. Probably a few of her crew sprinkled in. “We’ll have to be ready for anything.”

Kagan stood, as well, perching on the edge of the porch just out of the rain, his back to Chandler as he put on his gloves. “If we could either destroy the last copy of the scans or make sure they never existed, and eliminate Janeway and Cabrera at the same time . . . .”

“That’s just more ‘ifs,’ my friend. Let’s not count our chickens.”

“I’ll be waiting for my orders,” Kagan said as he pulled his hood over his head and started down the path into the woods. He had five kilometers to hike to his beam out site.

Chandler watched his partner stride into the forest, and then he went into the cold, dark cabin. As he prepared for the arrival of his wife and children, starting the furnace and loading food into the chiller, he thought about what needed to be done. Two of his three problems seemed to be working at counter purposes.

He needed to find out for sure whether Cabrera still had a copy of the Belle Colony scans. The only way to confirm that was to allow Cabrera access to the moon where the information was likely to be turned over to the Starfleet officers meeting him. But he also needed to eliminate the people who were so tenacious about looking into the Belle Colony destruction-Cabrera, Janeway, and her loyal crew. That problem was much more difficult to handle, since he could ill afford to murder a Starfleet admiral.

The third problem was the persistent rumor that Chakotay had survived the brutality of the dilithium mines. He was beginning to believe that both Chakotay and Janeway had charmed lives, for their every attempt to eliminate the pair had met with failure. But, there were several weeks until this meeting on the moon, and he had resources still available to him both in the Federation and in the region of space occupied by the Caritas. He smiled to himself and quickly placed a few encrypted calls.

Kathryn Janeway stood on the sidewalk across the street from her apartment building and watched the firefighters struggle to bring the flames under control. The heat of the inferno was warm on her face and kept her from shivering in the early morning chill of New Year’s Day. She glanced at the security officer standing next to her.
“Were there any casualties?”

“A couple of people were injured by debris falling on them in the street,” he replied, his face a crimson red in the reflected firelight, “but apparently all the residents are off- planet on vacation-except for you.” He put a hand on her shoulder. “It’s lucky you weren’t home, Admiral.”

Janeway shivered at the thought. “I’d planned to be at home, but my friends insisted that I stay overnight after their New Year’s Eve party. Was it an accident?”

The officer shook his head. “We think whoever did this was after the previous occupant of your apartment. He was a Romulan diplomat, and he had a lot of enemies.”

Janeway stepped back as a secondary explosion rocked the building. “So it was a bomb?”

“Yes, ma’am. And a pretty powerful one, if I’m any judge of it.” There was a sudden shout from the street as the firefighters gave up on their efforts and pulled back. Moments later, as the three-story edifice crumbled in on itself, the security officer pulled Janeway behind a piece of emergency equipment for protection from flying debris. “Do you have somewhere else to stay, Admiral?”

She nodded, checking the time. “It won’t be long until dawn. I’ll go to my office and make some arrangements. There should be plenty of room at the BOQ this time of year.”

“I can give you a lift,” he offered. “I have to go over and make a report to Starfleet, since the building housed you and several other high-ranking officers.”

“Thank you, but that won’t be necessary. My ride’s waiting for me just a block or two away.”

“I’m sorry this has happened, ma’am, but at least you weren’t home.”

“Thank God no one was injured.” She studied the rubble of her former home and then thanked him for his help before she headed for Tom Paris’ auto.

“Looks like a total loss,” she told him as she climbed in. “I’m sure glad I never bothered to unpack any of my mementoes.”

“And I’m glad B’Elanna talked you into staying with us tonight. There’s no way anyone could’ve survived a fire that intense.”

“They think it was probably bomb.”

Tom drove toward Starfleet headquarters, carefully navigating past the emergency equipment. “A bomb? In the middle of San Francisco?”

“The security officer said that one of the previous residents was a Romulan with a lot of enemies. He was supposedly the target.”

“What do you mean, ‘supposedly’?”

She pushed the hood of her coat off her head and studied the horizon, noticing that the sky was beginning to turn pale as dawn approached. “I’ve had too many close calls lately to think for a minute that I wasn’t the bomber’s target.”

Tom stared at her a moment and then pulled up to the front gates of Starfleet Headquarters where they showed their identification and then drove toward her office building. “Kathryn, you’re scaring me.”

“You should be scared, Tom. It isn’t safe to be anywhere near me.” She laughed, even though there was no humor in her eyes. “If you don’t mind, just leave me at my office. I might as well call Tuvok before he hears about this over the news reports.”

“Yeah, I’m thinking something a bombing would be enough to make a Vulcan panic.” The odor from the fire was still in the air when he pulled into the parking lot. “You’re welcome to stay with us until you can find a new place of your own, you know.”

“I appreciate the offer, Tom, but I wouldn’t think of putting you and your family in harm’s way—and especially not Miral. I’ll get some temporary quarters for now.”

“This time, on Starfleet property, I hope.”

She sighed in exasperation. “I’m not sure where I live will make any difference, Tom.”

“Well, be careful, okay? And keep us posted?”

“I will, Tom. Thanks for everything.”

When she arrived at her office, she wasn’t surprised to find a half-dozen messages waiting for her from people who had already heard about the bombing. She contacted her mother and sister to let them know she was alive and well, but then she ignored the other messages in favor of an active call that had just arrived from Vulcan. Tuvok, of course.

“So,” she said when her friend’s face appeared on the view screen, “you’ve already heard about the bombing?”

“The bombing? There’s been a bombing?” The only visible sign of surprise on his face was an arched eyebrow.

She quickly related the evening’s events, including her impromptu decision to stay with Tom and B’Elanna once their New Year’s Eve party ended, a decision that had apparently saved her life. She repeated the security officer’s speculation that the intended victim had been the previous resident, an unpopular Romulan diplomat.

“I find that highly unlikely,” Tuvok disagreed. “You’ve been living there for the last four months, and I happen to know that the previous resident is in a prison on Romulus, serving a long sentence for influence peddling.”

She nodded and sipped the coffee she’d replicated, grateful for the warm liquid and the caffeine. “I thought as much. The bomb was intended for me.”

“Undoubtedly.”

She studied his face, realizing for the first time that he must have been calling her for a completely unrelated reason. “If you hadn’t heard about the bombing, then why were you calling me? What’s happened?”

“I received a message from Tom Riker,” he began, pausing to confirm that their connection was encrypted. “He had some troubling news. You stayed at an orphanage during your recent recovery, correct?”

Janeway felt weak with apprehension. “You know I did.”

“The orphanage was attacked by a group of men who were searching for a man called Tyee.”

Janeway blinked in surprise. Had Section 31 made the connection between Tyee and Chakotay? If they’d figured out that Chakotay was alive, would they hesitate to find him and kill him? When she was able to speak, she asked, “Was he there?”

“Apparently not. Tom Riker said that he had decided to ‘hire out’ as the Caritas often do.”

This news surprised her. Although Chakotay had mentioned leaving the orphanage as a possibility, she’d received a short note from him every few weeks, and he’d said nothing about hiring out the near future. Was it possible that he’d left just before the attack? “What did they do when they discovered Tyee was gone?”

“Riker said that they threatened the children in an effort to get information on his whereabouts, but when they realized that neither the adults nor the children had any relevant information, the attackers herded them into the yard and then burned the house and barn right in front of their eyes.”

Janeway closed her eyes in grief, imagining how awful it must have been for those traumatized children to watch their new home and security go up in flames. “Was anyone hurt?”

“No one from the orphanage.” He paused, using the time to carefully choose his words. He’d learned that disturbing news had to be presented to humans with a certain degree of finesse, or they would not remain open to continuing conversation. “The woman who runs the orphanage had informed the Caritas of the attack, and they arrived to assist the orphans.”

Janeway frowned. “The Caritas are not equipped for that kind of confrontation, Tuvok.”

“They did what they could. They suffered two casualties in the course of the fight. One man was killed and a woman was critically injured.”

“Who?” She stared at him, her eyes wide with fear. “Who was killed? Who was injured?”

“Just a moment.” Tuvok consulted a PADD. “Chet Borland was killed, and Ro Laren was injured, but she’s expected to recover. There were other minor injuries among the Caritas, but nothing worse than a broken arm or concussion.”

“And the attackers?”

“They escaped.”

Distraught, Janeway covered her mouth with her hand. She’d told Tom that no one was safe in her presence or Chakotay’s, but all the humor had gone out of that quip. They truly were a threat to everyone they knew and loved. “When will this end, Tuvok? How can we make them stop?”

“There’s more,” he answered. “Riker said the attackers escaped in a ship that was equipped with a phased cloak.”

“A phased cloak?” Her head snapped up. “Unionists? Were the attackers Utavi?”

“Apparently so.”

For a moment, Janeway was frozen in her chair, but then the next moment she found it impossible to sit still. Without a word of explanation, she left her desk and began to pace as she tried to grasp the full implications of what had happened.

She was more convinced than ever that Section 31 was behind these attempts on their lives and was both frightened and dismayed to learn that they had apparently continued their alliance with the Utavi. She forced the fear away and tried to think.

Her thoughts went to Marilas, her two elderly sisters, and the orphans, innocent bystanders in a universe gone mad. She imagined them huddled together, watching in horror as their home was burned to the ground; she saw them, terrified, running for cover as the Caritas fought to subdue their attackers. And why? Why were they being terrorized by these bullies? Because they had taken Chakotay into their home when he was nearly dead? Because they had given her a place to restore her health? Because they were kind and helpful to anyone in need?

She fought against the irrational guilt that threatened to strangle her, telling herself that she was no more to blame for what had happened to the orphanage or to the Caritas than Chakotay had been for the destruction of Belle Colony. He’d been lured into the raid and forced to leave Voyager, thinking he was doing the crew a favor by disappearing and distancing them from his own shame. She’d done nothing more culpable than search for the truth. If she gave up now, Section 31 would win much more than this simple battle. They’d be free to practice their evil ways throughout the Federation, and she wasn’t about to let that happen. Not by a long shot.

She returned to her chair with new resolve, unsurprised to find Tuvok patiently waiting for her. “I will be seeing you in a few weeks?” she asked him, reminding him of their scheduled meeting on Tevlik’s moon.

“I hope so, Admiral. My plans remain unchanged.”

“You realize, of course, that we’ll probably have company?” She wasn’t about to mention Section 31 out loud, not even over an encrypted connection.

“I’m planning on it,” he replied, his expression never changing. “We’ll have friends with us, and we’ll be ready for anything.”

“And the meeting ground? You’ll inspect it in advance?”

He inclined his head. “As we discussed.”

She smiled. “Good. In the meantime, Tuvok, keep in touch.”

Once their conversation ended, Janeway worked through the rest of her messages and then sat back to watch the sun appear over the buildings as she finished her third cup of coffee. It was during quiet times like this, private moments of reflection, that she missed Chakotay the most.

She couldn’t help but worry about him. Riker said that he’d hired out, and she wondered where he was and whether he was all right. Why would he leave without telling her what he was doing? The most recent attacks gave her a sinking feeling, and she promised herself that she’d contact Riker and follow up on his whereabouts.

She had just made arrangements for temporary quarters when the sound of an incoming priority message caught her attention. She pulled up the screen to see who it was from and was irritated that it was encrypted. Exhausted from the late night and interrupted sleep, she decided to leave it for the next day, assuming that the message had something to do with her most recent work with the Romulan Senate or that it was an update on the investigation into the destruction of her apartment building. She needed a hot shower, a change of clothes, and long nap much more than she needed to get involved in some new complication from work.

Determined to spend the rest of the day getting some rest, Janeway prepared to leave her office. She spent afew minutes straightening up her desk and recycling the rest of her coffee before she grabbed her jacket and turned down the lights. She was almost past her desk when the flashing red light of the message queue caught her eye once again and brought her to a stop.

“How long would it take?” she asked herself as she sat down at the desk and pulled up the message. She secured the doors, propped her feet on her desk, and ordered the computer to access the message. “Recognize Admiral Kathryn Janeway,” she said.

“Voiceprint confirmed,” the computer replied. “State clearance code.”

She laced her fingers behind her head and closed her eyes, blinking against the sandy texture under her eyelids. “Janeway five three four two nine blue. Clearance level ten.”

“Access denied.”

Her eyes flew open. “Access denied? What the hell . . . ?” She sat up and pulled the screen closer, already regretting her decision to stay instead of leaving this for the next day. Now that her curiosity had been piqued, she wouldn’t go until she found out what was wrong. “Computer. Verify clearance code.”

“The clearance code stated matches the current Starfleet file for Admiral Kathryn Janeway.”

“I thought so,” she mumbled, thinking out loud. “Then why doesn’t the message open?”

“Insufficient data,” the computer answered.

“I wasn’t asking you.” Janeway studied the screen, pulling up the message’s properties and doing a simple scan for routing. “This opening alpha-numeric sequence seems familiar . . . of course. Tuvok’s message from Riker!”

She accessed the codes she used to decrypt Chakotay’s messages and downloaded the text message onto a PADD. A quick scan told her that all but the last paragraph was the same account of the attack on the orphanage that Tuvok had related to her. The final section, however, made her blood run cold.

Riker wrote, “Part of what I told Tuvok about Tyee was a deliberate fabrication, mainly because I’m afraid his mail is being monitored. The truth is that Tyee left the orphanage a couple of weeks after you did, Kathryn, and that he did so without telling me or any of the Caritas where he was going. In fact, he had Marilas send me the messages I forwarded on to you every couple of weeks just to keep anyone from guessing that he’d left.”

Janeway sat up straight in her chair with her heart pounding. If what Tom said was correct, Chakotay had left the orphanage over three months earlier. She struggled to get over the shock the news created and think about where he would have gone and why he would go without telling her. She suspected he was involved in something she wouldn’t condone, a bad habit she thought she’d cured while they were on Voyager, and she experienced the usual anger and frustration his unilateral actions produced. Yet, the realization that Marilas had cooperated with him on this subterfuge gave her hope that his departure happened for a logical and necessary purpose.

She sat quietly for a few moments, trying to calm her fears, before she read the rest of Tom’s message: “When we realized that he’d disappeared again, we were worried about him and thought we should try to track him down, but Laren suggested that his sudden departure must be part of your plan. We’d feel better if you’d confirm that you know where he is and what he’s doing. Could you let us know via a return message?”

“I wish I could, Tom,” she answered, experiencing more apprehension than she’d felt as she watched her apartment building burn to the ground. “I wish I knew.”