CHAPTER 7

Hoshi's anger burned itself out shortly after Kleth left her cabin. She couldn't be angry at the Klingon. He had stated the truth -- she was attracted to the Starfleet man. Leave it to the big Klingon to throw it in her face in order for her to admit it.

With a flush of shame she realized that, ever since that brief moment on the freighter's bridge, she'd been thinking less often of Matthew and more and more about... She didn't even know his name!

Turning to her computer, she quickly tapped into communications and set up a link with the Earth information network. She brought up what data she could about Starfleet. She didn't try to access its service records directly, but instead entered a request about resources available to the shipping industry through Starfleet.

When queried for more specifics, she typed in her old H-S Shipping identification code for use with Starfleet. Every company doing business with Starfleet had one, and she and her husband had been under contract a few times to haul raw materials to Earth for Starfleet's ship construction program. If the new owners hadn't changed the number, she'd be in.

With satisfaction she watched as a new menu popped up. Choosing the heading "contacts and personnel," she scrolled down the list that appeared. She checked the pictures accompanying the brief biographies under the "piracy countermeasures" section, and was rewarded when she saw his face.

She read the small amount of information accompanying the picture. Cmdr. Malcolm Reed, Starfleet Operations, former security officer, currently assigned to the anti-piracy division. Field operations, not available at this time.

She leaned back as she gazed at the searing blue-grey eyes that stared out at her from the screen. The information told her nothing she hadn't figured out already, other than his name. But at least she had a name to go with his face.

Perhaps when this was over, she'd drop a line to Starfleet telling them how easy it was to gain access to information about their personnel, she thought in grim amusement.

Reed was glad to be leaving. As he engaged the scout ship's thrusters, he was relieved this dirty planet was soon going to be behind him.

The past two days had been nothing but aggravation. He had visited various businesses that might be supplying the pirates, but had come away with no new information. The tight-lipped merchants wouldn't talk about their customers. It had been a fruitless task, but he'd had to pass the time somehow as they'd waited for the Klingons to leave orbit. Tucker would be dead by now if he hadn't.

First, there were the close quarters on the scout ship. And as if tripping over the man every time he tried to do something wasn't enough, Tucker talked. Constantly. Cheerfully. In that dreadful accent. Even in his sleep.

Reed had put up with it for six hours after his return from the restaurant before he couldn't take it any more. Knowing he might need Tucker if there was engine trouble whenever they did get back into space, he decided it would be better to go back to the city than to kill him. Hence his wasted efforts trying to gain information about Hoshi Sato and her band of renegade Klingons.

Thankfully, Tucker was silent as they lifted off. Reed laid in a low run at quarter impulse around the planet's surface so they would look like one of the locals to avoid the Klingons spotting them as the Falcon broke orbit. Reed was sure they would be scanning for anyone following them.

He waited until the Falcon had departed the system, then punched in the course heading as relayed by the tracker. Soon after leaving the planet's atmosphere, he had the scout ship traveling at warp 3, matching the course and speed of his quarry in the hope he could masquerade as a sensor ghost.

"Intermix is runnin' a bit on the hot side," Tucker said from behind his shoulder where he was watching the engine monitors.

"Is that going to cause a problem?" Reed asked.

"Shouldn't, as long as we keep an even speed."

Reed let out his breath in a gust. The experimental engine had been performing flawlessly since they'd left Enterprise, almost as if it were a sentient being and knew there was a babysitter along. So far, all Tucker had done was talk to the damn thing and it had behaved perfectly.

He hoped their luck held, and that it included Hoshi Sato leading him to the pirate organization's leader.

Hoshi felt the tension that had been a constant annoyance the last few days lessen as the Falcon put the miserable planet behind them. She'd been like a coiled spring the entire time they'd waited for the transporter circuit to be fabricated.

Now it had been installed, and Malin had declared the transporter operational. She'd given him one of her rare full smiles at that news, and had laughed inwardly at the dazed expression that had crossed his face as his demanding captain had praised him in front of the entire bridge crew.

"Kleth!" she said imperiously. "We should celebrate leaving that worthless place. Open the barrels of blood wine tonight."

At her announcement, a round of cheers rang out on the bridge, Kleth's voice among them.

The cheers died away when Garef turned from the helm to face her. "There is another ship following our course."

Hoshi's tension hitched back up, and she exchanged a glance with Kleth. "It's him," she said.

Kleth looked at the readout on Garef's console and considered. Looking back at her, he said, "It could be a sensor ghost."

"No, it's too much of a coincidence." She straightened the gold sash on her hips as she looked at the stars on the viewscreen, trying to figure a course of action.

"Your orders?" Kleth asked.

"Continue our present course and speed. For now, we will act as if we are unaware of it," she said.

Reed watched the tracker's signal as they followed the Falcon. They had been on the pirate ship's trail for more than ten hours now. So far, the signal hadn't wavered.

He looked back over his shoulder at the bunk and saw Tucker stretched out asleep. Giving thanks for small mercies, he closed his eyes, enjoying the silence. As he tried to relax, he closed his eyes and thought about Hoshi Sato.

He could picture her face in his mind, hear the soft inflections of her voice even when it was raised in anger. He wondered if her skin would feel as silky as it looked.

Stop it! he chided himself. He was on assignment. He couldn't allow himself to be distracted, much as he wanted to be. He would use her to lead him to bigger fish, that's all.

He squeezed his eyes shut even tighter as he heard Tucker begin to snore, and wondered if he could gag the man without waking him.

A beep from the navigation console made his eyes snap open. The Falcon had speeded up. He hurried to input the change into the helm control and could feel the scout ship surge ahead as it matched the warbird's new pace.

"What's goin' on?" Tucker asked as he sat up on the bunk.

"They've increased their speed."

"To what?" the engineer asked, getting up to move to the engine monitors.

"Three-point-five."

Tucker frowned at the monitors and made a few slight adjustments. "Oh, oh," he said, and began to remove the panel cover.

"What's the matter?" Reed asked.

"The intermix is actin' up. I'll try--"

A loud bang reverberated throughout the tiny ship.

"What was that?" Reed shouted, turning back to the controls to see that their speed was dropping rapidly.

Tucker's voice was strained as he frantically tore at something in the panel. "The injector is offline. Something must have moved it out of alignment. I'm going to have to go in manually and fix it."

"Do it fast," Reed said from the pilot's chair. "The Klingons have seen us."