MISSION TO DALETH IV
by Soledad
Disclaimer: All Star Trek belongs to Gene Roddenberry and Viacom or whoever owns the rights at this moment. I don't make any profit out of this – I wish I would, but I don't, so suing me would be pointless.
Rating: strong R
Series: "The Lost Years"
Star Trek incarnation: Original Series
Warnings: semi non-con, m/m, AU, drug abuse, sexual slavery of some sort. This is not a nice story, so read to your own risk, please.
Archiving: Sure, just ask first. I prefer to know where my stuff goes.
Summary: an undercover unit of Starfleet Intelligence is forced to use unconventional methods to blow up a ring of the Orion Syndicate on the Daleth trade station.
FOREWORD
This story loosely belongs to my Battlestar Galactica/Original Trek crossover AU-series titled "The Lost Years", which describes the second five-year-mission of Kirk's Enterprise. Not many people know, but Gene Roddenberry actually had planned to make a second series with the original cast, and what later became the first movie would have been its pilot.
This story, however, has none of the main canon characters, only a handful of supporting ones. It features a great many OCs, most importantly a well-oiled unit of Starfleet Intelligence, which appears in irregular intervals in the actual series. Basically, this is a complementary story to the 18th adventure of the "Lost Years" series, a story that is titled "Nemesis".
"Mission to Daleth IV" takes place five years before "Nemesis" – this is the year 2269, the 3rd year if the Original Series. The members of the SI unit have been inspired by certain lead characters of the series "SeaQuest" but have completely different backgrounds and personalities here, even different names. I only used the visuals (i.e. the actors). The dramatis personae will be listed after the epilogue, so that readers could have their fun by guessing who are the good guys and who are the bad ones.
The unit had been working on the Daleth station for three years at the beginning of this story. The idea of the Free Agents of the Federation belongs to Sondra Marshak and her co-writer, Myrna Culbreath. I found it in one of the TOS-novels and found it very useful for my series.
In the Romulan name-giving, I followed the lead given in Diane Duane's excellent TOS-novel "The Romulan Way".
CHAPTER 01: ASTRONOMY, POLITICS AND SCHEMING
For disclaimer, rating, etc., see the Foreword.
Author's notes:
The data about the Rigel system and about the classification of planets are taken from "The Words of the Federation" by Shane Johnson – an excellent background book. The name of the tertiary star (Daleth) is my addition, though, and so are its planets and the trade station. T'Sedd, the Federation representative of Rigel V is taken from the same book.
Rigel is an actually existing twin star, 900 light years from Earth, according to the "dtv-Atlas zur Astronomie" by Joachim Hermann.
The Alpha Centauri Concordium of Planets is mentioned by this name in the "Star Fleet Technical Manual" by Franz Joseph. As for the inhabitants, I know "Centaurian" sounds a little awkward, but I wanted to avoid any misunderstandings concerning the Centauri from the B5 universe. I know the first chapter is a little information-heavy, but it is necessary to understand the circumstances, and it will change in the following ones.
And no, the sentient saber-tooth turtles aren't my idea. They are a genuine Roddenberry item™.
THE PAST
Even for the eyes of the unaffected beholder, the Rigel system was one of the most spectacular ones in Federation space. A quadralupe star system, the two main stars of which – a blue-white super giant and a somewhat smaller blue-white giant – supported a total of thirteen planets, six of which were inhabited. This remarkable number of Class M worlds could be attributed to the system's extensive habitable orbital zone and to the Hakel radiation belt that surrounded the system's primary and shielded the planets from the lethal doses of radiation emitted by the super giant.
The Rigel system was one of the main strongholds and one of the most vulnerable spots of the Federation, due to the various peoples that lived on its habitable planets.
Rigel II and Rigel IV, sometimes referred to as the Rigel Colonies, were settled by Terran colonists at the end of the 21st century. It was the first great expansion of humans into known space – or into less known space in this case, as they had not yet been capable of building huge colonization ships at that time, especially not warp-capable ones. There were, after all, 900 light years between the Sol- and the Rigel systems. But they had already had a working alliance with the Alpha Centauri Concordium of Planets, a bond of planets who had had a long tradition in colonization, and the Centaurians willingly lent them a hand in ferrying their people to their new homes.
In the middle of the 23rd century the Rigel Colonies were major Federation worlds with a combined population of more than eight billion. Mostly humans, but many Centaurians, Vulcans or Tellarites lived among them as well. The two Colonies were working with united efforts on the terraforming of Rigel III and hoped to have succeeded by the beginning of the 24th century.
Rigel V. was populated by two different intelligent species. The ingenious people, some sort of sentient saber-tooth turtles, lived on an isolated continent of the size of Australia, and their numbers had been slowly but steadily dwindling for at least a thousand standard years. The main continents belonged to a vulcanoid population of 1.3 billion. These vulcanoids, called generally Rigelians, had immigrated to Rigel V approximately six thousand years earlier and were believed to be the result of Vulcan's first huge colonization wave. They still had the great physical similarity with the actual Vulcans, but as they had left their planet of origin way before Surak's Reformation, they have developed a culture of their own that was about as different from Vulcan's as the Romulans' was. Nevertheless, Rigel V had been a member of the Federation since 2184, when the Rigel Accords had been signed into law.
Rigel VI and Rigel VII were a double planet system in a trojan orbit. Rigel VI was a major trade centre that coordinated much of the cargo transportation that took place between the Rigel system and other Federation worlds and even had large orbital shipyards for the building of transport tugs and containers. The government of Rigel VI was also in charge of the surveillance stations in orbit of their twin world.
That was more than necessary, as Rigel VII, a rather large Class M world, was widely inhabited by a belligerent race of seven-foot-tall Neanderthal-like humanoids called the Kalar. Technologically quite primitive, the Kalar rated a D-plus on the Richter Scale of Culture and consequently hostile and dangerous. Visiting Rigel VII was therefore forbidden for all Federation races, due to the Prime Directive. Which meant, of course, that the Federation worlds in the Rigel system had to ensure that no other races interfered with the natural development of the Kalar either.
And that was not an easy task, considering the immediate neighbourhood: Rigel VIII.
Also referred to as Orion, this particular world supported a native humanoid population of aggressive, yellow-skinned warriors and traders that numbered approximately 4.3 billion. On an isolated southern continent of the planet, however, another sentient species had developed, independently from the main population: a race of green-skinned savages that barely reached the level of coherent speech when found and enslaved by the Alpha race. The two races never intermarried, but the green savages were encouraged to breed among themselves, mostly because there was a great demand for the sensual and aggressive female dancers on the slave market, and the scaled males were excellent workers. Their population reached the number of 1.1 billion in the 23rd century.
After having developed (or stolen – this detail was never cleared to satisfaction) the capacity for interstellar travel, the Alpha race colonized the two planets of Rigel's blue giant secondary star and went on to form a pirate empire. That made them a very uncomfortable neighbourhood, especially because of the dispute about the ownership of Rigel XII.
This Class G desert planet was barely able to support humanoid life, due to its high gravity and distance from its sun. However, its large deposits of raw dilithium had made it invaluable to the Federation, which operated a small mining colony on the planet's surface. A vast, fully automated underground dilithium refining facility ran continually in order to supply the ever-increasing needs of the Federation.
And therein lay the problem. As T'Sedd, the representative of Rigel V in the Federation Council put it, it was easier to take the freshly killed prey of a hungry rukh than to protect resources of extreme value from the pirates of Orion. The hegemons of the Oligarchy considered everything they could lay their hand on their property and were not particularly picky in their methods.
Thus, to avoid an open conflict over Rigel XII, Daleth Station was built, designed to be a place of trade and diplomatic efforts, under the protection of Starfleet and the United Federation of Planets, but under civilian leadership. It was seen as an independent colony, allied to the Federation but not officially a part of it, with its own civilian constabulary and security forces and space patrols. Of course, practically it was an extended arm of Rigel VI, and the majority of its population of about 14,000 came from the Federation worlds of the Rigel system – or from other Federation worlds – but it had a strong Orion presence as well.
One that certain Federation officials – especially among the higher ranks of Starfleet – had begun to find a little too strong. It was not really a secret, after all, that the Free Merchants' Guild was, in fact, just the legal guise of the Orion Syndicate. Everyone knew that – but nobody could find any proof. At least not anyone who lived to tell the tale, that is.
Daleth Station had been built in stationary orbit of Daleth IV, the thirteenth planet of the Rigel system – and the only one belonging to the system's tertiary star, a small, weak sun called Daleth. The name Daleth IV wasn't entirely accurate, as the other three planetoids were, technically, no more than small moons in erratic orbits, thorn away from Rigel XII by Daleth's gravitation. But at the time when the astrophysicists realized their error, the name had already been established.
Daleth IV itself was a Class C planet, Venus Solis not unlike, with an iron/silicate surface, a reducing, dense atmosphere and a surface temperature so high that even automatic mining provided serious hindrances. But it had strategic importance for both trading and surveillance purposes. Both sides used the station to spy on each other, to set up meetings with each other and with third parties, and to make business, in- and outside the boundaries of legality. This strategic importance also made it the best place to plan a hard blow against the Syndicate – assuming, the Federation operatives lived long enough to work out how to do it.
People were usually surprised, though, when first confronted with the ethereal beauty of Daleth Station. Designed by T'Rall of Vulcan and influenced by Andorian architecture, it contained three concentric rings and a huge, domed central section in the middle, all made of pale blue, transparent metal. The rings were connected by diagonal corridors that rayed out from the central section like the spokes of a gigantic wheel – twelve of them. The docking ports for smaller starships, like Class I Fleet scouts or civilian freighters, were all around the outer ring, where these corridors joined the docking ring, while bigger ships had to remain in orbit and their crew used shuttles or transporters to visit the station.
The middle ring was the trading, shopping and entertaining mall of the station, while the smallest one served as habitat area for the permanent inhabitants. Finally, in the central section were the generators that kept the station running, the conference rooms for diplomatic issues, the weapons lockers for station security, the computer core and other most important systems without which the station would have been inoperable. The command and control room of the station was called Operations. It was manned by a civilian crew, hand-picked by the station leader who bore the official title of Colony Administrator (a friendly but highly efficient vulcanoid Rigelian named Thrae) and better protected than a small Federation Starbase.
THE PRESENT
The battered civilian freighter Bianchi, registered to a dubious trader from Rigel IV of the name of Cyrano Jones, was directed to Docking Port Six by Operations upon its arrival. The captain of that ship, a tall, middle-aged human of considerable girth and with a greying beard (well, at least he looked human, though one could never know at Daleth Station), was no stranger to the customs officers. They all knew him to be a harmless little smuggler who tried to cut out a meagre existence for himself by trading in kivas and trillium mostly – and, basically, in everything he could get his hands on. They didn't give him any trouble as long as he didn't cause any in exchange. He was a small fish, compared with the executives of the Orion Syndicate, not worth bothering.
"Captain Vierchi," the customs clerk in duty, a balding man in his early fifties, looked up at him with a genuine smile, "back already? Have you anything to declare?"
"Just the usual," Vierchi handed the clerk the data chip with his customs declaration. "How are things at Daleth Station?"
The clerk checked his declaration ad found it correct…more or less, as usual. "Same old, same old," he replied with a shrug and gave Vierchi back the data chip. "Oh, and by the way, your… associate has arrived two weeks ago."
"My associate?" Vierchi replied blandly. The clerk shrugged again, slight disgust on his usually neutral face.
"Mr. Cyrano Jones, free merchant extraordinaire. Among other things."
Vierchi sighed. "And I so hoped they would keep him on K-7 for a while! I guess I was too optimistic."
"Well, according to his log he did come here directly from K-7," the clerk said. "Mr. Lurry, the administrator of that station, sent us a memo right after Mr. Jones had filed his direction upon departure. Do you want a copy?"
Vierchi eyed him suspiciously. "What would that cost me?"
"Not much," the clerk said. "All you have to do is to get me some Antarean brandy. I mean the real thing, not the fake stuff they sell here. I'll even pay the price. I just want to taste the real item for a change."
Vierchi thought about his next planner route – and nodded. Yes, he could do it. It would take him slightly off curse, but not so much that it would disturb his carefully constructed timetable. And keeping a good relationship with station personnel was important for people like him.
"You have a deal," he said. "But it'll take a few weeks."
"It doesn't matter," the clerk handed him another data chip. "I don't need it before my daughter's eighteenth birthday, in three month's time. Here, you might find this useful. I'll never understand how you can work for someone like Cyrano Jones."
"Believe me, I didn't choose to," Vierchi replied with a sour face. "But when I lost my own ship, with everything else I had, because my drinking and gambling had brought me in debt I couldn't pay back, he was the only one who gave me a chance. I don't like him any more than you do, but the unpleasant fact is – I owe him my whole existence. Sure, he takes sixty per cent of all my profits, assuming I make any, but it's still better than prison."
The clerk nodded in sympathy. This was not the first similar story he had heard during his long career in administrative service, and like most of his colleagues, he was rather fond of the unlucky little smuggler.
"Well, good luck then," he said. "Do you need any repairs done on that rustpot you call a ship?"
"When do I not?" Vierchi asked back with a tired grin.
The clerk checked the duty roster of the maintenance crews. "Weeell, this seems to be your lucky day," he said. "Ms. Velez is on duty today, and she likes you, for some strange reason."
They both laughed. The legendary hatred of Chief Technician Nina Velez towards the whole male population of the universe was the constant subject of not always well-meant jokes. Vierchi supposed that it had to do something with her heritage – she was half-Klingon, after all, and no data about her Klingon parent could be found anywhere – and was as surprised as everyone when she began to loosen up around him.
"In that case," he said to the clerk, "I should maybe seek her out, before any more important assignments come up."
"That is probably a good idea," the clerk agreed.
Vierchi took his leave from the clerk and walked to the second ring, where the maintenance crews had their small emergency offices. It took him only a few minutes to find Emergency Office #4 and the person he was looking for. The tall woman standing in front of a comm panel and checking the work roster wore the bright orange coverall of the station's technicians. However, the sleeves of said coverall had been removed, most likely to give more room her broad shoulders and heavily muscled arms. A heavy tool-belt encircled her trim hips, but Vierchi had no doubt that there was at least one weapon hidden among the tools.
The delicately ridged, high forehead, framed by an unruly mass of chestnut curls, gave her lovely face an exotic look, but her piercing blue, almost colourless eyes revealed a keen, calculating mind. As always, Vierchi was glad that she considered him a friend – she could be a deadly enemy if provoked. He had seen her beating men twice of her size to bloody pulp, without breaking a sweat.
Upon seeing her visitor, Nina Velez' face lit up in delight.
"Vierchi, you old targ!" she cried out affectionately and gave him a bear hug that almost knackered a few of his ribs. "You are back early," she added in a considerably lower voice, almost a whisper, resting her face on his shoulder for cover.
Vierchi groaned in protest. "Nina, you'll be the death of me one of these days! Have mercy with an old man." Then he lowered his voice, too. "I had no other choice. Couldn't risk to go to K-7, after what happened there."
Nina Velez made a snort of agreement. "We've heard about it. Would it disturb our plans here?"
"Nah, I don't think so. It was an isolated incident, even though an unfortunate one," Vierchi raised his voice again, handing the half-Klingon woman a PADD. "Do you think you could take a look at my ship? The cargo transporter has problems rematerializing things."
Velez checked the list, reading between the lines what she needed to know. "Strange. I've checked that transporter of yours last time and it was all right."
Vierchi shrugged. "It's a fifteen-year-old piece of machinery, Nina. It breaks down frequently. And I can' afford a better one."
"All right, I'll see what I can do," Velez slapped him on the back in a friendly manner, nearly breaking one of his shoulder blades. "Go and look after your business, and I'll look after your ship. Luckily for you, I haven't got any urgent assignments right now."
Vierchi nodded in agreement. It was of utmost importance that he met his contacts and exchanged vital information with them.
"Have you any idea where I could find Mr. Sanchez?" he asked loudly. "He promised me to find me a First Mate I could actually pay. It's becoming difficult to fly the Bianchi alone, with all those problems surfacing in the most inconvenient moments."
Velez snorted in disgust. "In S'Bysh's Bar, where else? That P'takh sits there all day, drooling over the green savage dancers. Men," she added in her usual bitchy manner.
"Thanks," Vierchi yawned; he had had a long flight and wasn't exaggerating when he said it was becoming difficult alone. "I'll be on my way, then. See you later."
S'Bysh's Bar was on the almost completely opposite side of the second ring – a large establishment that even had a theatre stage to it, where the various exotic dancers performed. Most of them were female, green savages from Orion, who – as someone had once put – could overcome the senses of any man like an irresistible hunger attack. But there were others, too, no lesser attractive ones.
When Vierchi entered the bar, a young, male Mo'ari dancer from Alpha Centauri IV, easily recognizable due his scarlet eyes and the small, horn-like ridges along his temples, was swaying to the slow, throbbing rhythm of Orion flutes like a beautiful and deadly cobra. His smooth, mahogany-coloured body was naked, save a small loincloth of some golden stuff, tiny golden bells were attached to his nipple rings, and a topaz-like jewel glittered in his navel. Every sway and twist of that perfect, nude body was designed to invoke a response from the audience – a base and animalistic one, and according to the hunger in those watching eyes, the dancer was eminently successful.
This was not a success without grave danger, however, as his wasn't the only influence on the customers here. The experienced nose of Vierchi could separate the vapours of at least three or four different drugs, all considered illegal on a hundred Federation (or other) worlds, half a dozen sorts of smuggled alcoholic beverages from Romulan ale to Aldebaran whiskey, and he could hear the faint groans from the back rooms (separated by thin curtains only), the unmistakable reaction to the use of cardiac stimulators.
S'Bysh's Bar was the absolute bottom of the gutter on Daleth Station – which made it the ideal place for Vierchi's purposes. The noise (and the state most of the customers were in all the time) made listening devices practically useless, and it was a hard thing to spy on someone who made his business in plain view.
Vierchi gave his eyes a moment to adjust, looking around the intoxicated crowd. It took him less than a minute to find the person he wanted to speak, and he crossed the bar, aiming to the table near the stage. The table of Diego Sanchez, a shady agent, who dealt in exotic dancers mostly, but was occasionally willing to find other employees for his customers, if there was a demand.
The man was in his mid-thirties, well-built, and he could have been considered handsome, had he not given a certain… oily impression. Vierchi couldn't find a word that would be more matching. Whether that impression came from the too-brilliant hair gel Sanchez preferred, from the fact that the man was never clean-shaved, or from that nasty, unpleasant smile practically plastered on his face all the time, Vierchi couldn't decide. But the man was… well, he was oily.
Sanchez wasn't sitting alone. He was accompanied by another Mo'ari male, an elder, heavier built version of the exotic dancer. The two bald, dark-skinned, red-eyed men looked so much alike that they simply had to be related. Father and son, perhaps. Or brothers, with a considerable age difference. It made sense, actually. The Mo'ari guarded the young boys that worked as dancers on alien words jealously. Contrary to common belief, the boys were not on sale, just their dancing skills.
Unfortunately, many other species seemed unable to understand the difference. Especially not the outrageously rich Orion potentates that lusted as much after beautiful young boys as they lusted after voluptuous, savage women. No wonder the older Mo'ari was sitting there, watching the young dancer like a hawk, ready to jump to his defence any moment.
Vierchi sat down to the table, careful not to block the Mo'ari's view. Sanchez cast him a curious look.
"You are early.
"So I am," Vierchi replied in a long-suffering manner. "Do you have a First Mate for me yet?"
"It depends."
"On what?"
"On the question whether you are willing to accept a sixth-generation clone. The guy is reliable, but you know how suddenly they can turn instable."
They exchanged looks full of veiled understanding. Then Vierchi shrugged. "Do I have any other choice?"
"Not really," Sanchez replied. "That rustpot you fly isn't a very… encouraging sight, you know."
"It flies better than it looks," said Vierchi slowly. Which was an understatement, and they both knew it. "But I take what… whom I can get."
Sanchez nodded, acknowledging unspoken answers of various levels. "Deal. You can get him tonight."
"Already? That was fast!"
"Well, yeah, his previous engagement was finished earlier than expected, and…" catching the warning look of his Mo'ari companion, Sanchez shut up abruptly.
"Forrd'hall is about to finish his number," the Mo'ari said; he spoke Standard, but with the thick, guttural accent of his people. "He'll have a few minutes before his next performance."
"How many numbers does he have tonight?" Vierchi asked.
"Five," Sanchez replied. "This is his third one. He'll be pretty drained when he's finally done."
"Well, you were the one who got him a contract in this hellhole," the Mo'ari pointed out sourly. "This is the worst job he's ever had – and the most dangerous one."
"Drreg," Sanchez answered patiently, "he needed this contract. You know that. This was the best I could come up with."
Drreg'holl O'toah Langeisi Zairn nodded glumly. "I know. The question is, however – how high is the price going to be? And who's gonna pay it?"
Sanchez waved off impatiently. "You worry too much.
"Well, someone has to," the Mo'ari grumbled, "since you obviously don't."
Tosing applause interrupted them, as the young dancer finished his performance and left the stage, running down lightly the six side steps to join them. He recognized Vierchi, nodded and smiled, but his deep red eyes narrowed slightly.
"Save your breath," Vierchi said. "I know I am early."
"Have you at least got what we needed?" the dancer asked, his tone light and teasing, but his eyes deadly serious.
Vierchi nodded. "Most of it. My… associate run into problems last year, as you probably know."
"We've heard of it," the dancer unexpectedly broke into a wide grin, his perfect, white teeth gleaming. "In fact, everyone on the station knows it by now. He hasn't stopped lamenting about his months-long martyrium for the last two weeks."
Vierchi grinned, too, but his eyes remained just as serious as the dancers'. "Clever," he said, impressed.
The dancer nodded. "Yeah, he knows what he is doing. People would hear of it anyway, at least he has the chance to tell his version."
"I've got a copy from his release report," Vierchi said, "but it'll cost me a bottle of Antarean brandy, eventually. The real stuff."
"That is doable," Sanchez answered at the questioning look of the dancer. "I'll look into it. By the way, Sdan has arrived an hour ago or so."
Vierchi raised a burly eyebrow. "The mercenary? I didn't know that he was involved."
"He is not," the older Mo'ari said. "He is here on his own business."
"Do you know what it is?" the dancer asked. His brother shook his head.
"Nah. You know his lot. Discretion is their life insurance."
"What about the Rihannha girl?" Vierchi asked.
Sanchez shrugged. "She is clean. I doubt that she has any idea whom she works for."
"That was not what I meant," Vierchi said.
"I know. But she is clean, in every possible way. She was just unlucky to serve someone who has fallen from grace."
"She still could get in great trouble if things turn really serious here," Vierchi pointed out.
"Is that our concern?" the older Mo'ari asked cynically.
"It is mine," Vierchi countered. "I was the one who brought her here. And we were involved in getting her the job she has now. A job that could get her into some penal colony."
All eyes turned to the young dancer expectantly. He thought for a moment; then he nodded.
"Warn her," he said to Vierchi. "We are responsible for her involvement. The least we can do is to offer her a way out."
"Can we?" Sanchez asked quietly. "Vierchi can't take her with him, not this time."
"No," the dancer agreed, "but maybe Sdan can."
"And just how do you intend to talk a mercenary into an errand of mercy?" Vierchi asked doubtfully. The dancer shrugged.
"He owes us. We'll collect that debt," he glanced at the stage where the green Orion females neared the end of their performance. "I gotta go back, soon. Sanchez, can you talk to Sdan? You know him the best from us all. Tell him to take her to Rigel IV – Mistress B'Atha will take her in, until we can find a place for her. Right now we have more important things to do. The next six to eight weeks will decide everything we've worked for so long."
He rose. "I have to go back. Will you contact Ben any time soon?"
"In four days' time."
"Good. The girl will need and ID. And we will need those codes."
"I know. We're working on it."
"Then work harder. Time is an important factor here."
He returned to the stage, and the others watched his performance for a while. Then Vierchi stood.
"I have to go, too," he said. "There are a few more people I need to meet."
Sanchez nodded absently. "I'll deliver your First Mate shortly before midnight. And Vierchi… be careful."
"I always am."
"You know what I meant."
Yeah," Vierchi yawned. "Don't worry. I've been dry for years, and I don't intend to change that now."
TBC