Part One
"Eighty years ago, the great General K'Vusk led his men into a glorious battle. Today, we honour each of them as we do the same."
Klath, the imposing Klingon weapons chief of the merchant ship Bounty, stood in the ship's rear cargo bay, in the middle of delivering the speech of his life.
Anyone who knew him also knew that he wasn't much of a talker. Still, he felt that an occasion such as this deserved some sort of ceremony. And he had been up most of the previous night on their journey here to memorise his lines.
"You all know why we are here," he continued, his booming voice echoing out through the bay, "We have been given a call to arms, and we have answered that call. Together, we will not rest, we will not weaken, and we will not falter until the ground is covered with the blood of our enemies."
He was particularly proud of that part of his speech, even if he had loosely based it on the words purportedly uttered by Kahless himself before a memorable victory over one of Molor's armies in the Hamar mountains on Qo'noS many centuries ago. Light plagiarism issues aside, he felt as though they were some pretty inspiring words. Even if he did say so himself.
Though he was somewhat disappointed to see that they hadn't seemed to garner much of a reaction from any of his troops in the same way that Kahless had certainly managed to do with his words all those years ago.
Across the expanse of the Bounty's mostly empty cargo area, the rest of the ship's motley crew had diligently lined up for inspection.
In the long and almost entirely fractious history of the Klingon people, plenty of brave leaders had gazed upon the men under their command before a battle with pride. General K'Vusk had surely been no exception, eighty years ago, when he had looked out at those thousands of armour-clad warriors on the surface of Iota Geminorum IV.
But as Klath surveyed the collection of individuals in front of him, he couldn't bring himself to share that sort of feeling.
Firstly, there was the Bounty's de facto captain, Jirel. The rangy unjoined Trill slouched slightly, rather than standing to attention, and was patiently listening to the Klingon's words with a trace of a smile that suggested he wasn't quite taking their upcoming battle entirely seriously.
Then came Denella, the Bounty's Orion engineer. Of all the figures in line, she was the only one that was at least doing her best to stand to attention, giving the situation the gravity that she felt it merited. Klath respected this, and was glad that at least someone was taking things seriously, even if he noted that her back was a little too arched in her at-attention stance.
Next came Natasha Kinsen, the ex-Starfleet human doctor of the ship. She was staring straight at him as he spoke, but with a deep scowl on her face, making her feelings on the situation known without having to utter a single word. Klath refused to acknowledge the scowl.
And finally there was Sunek, the Bounty's curiously emotional Vulcan pilot. He had his usual grin plastered on his face underneath his unkempt shock of hair. And for reasons Klath was certain were merely part of his innate desire to wind the Klingon up, he had turned up for inspection with his face smeared with freshly replicated camouflage paint, like an old school commando. The overall effectiveness of that paint was somewhat offset by the especially garish Hawaiian shirt he had opted for this evening. All things considered, he couldn't have been taking their battle less seriously if he had tried.
Klath sighed inwardly and did his best to ignore the Vulcan's grinning painted features as much as he was ignoring the human's dark scowl, as he neared the end of his brief, impassioned speech.
"The fight will not be an easy one. Our enemies are vast in number and quickly replenish our resources. What they lack in power and size, they make up for in persistence and cunning. But we must bring them to their knees. And we will!"
He paused for applause. The cargo bay remained silent, save for a slight grimace from Denella, whose back was starting to spasm from all the standing to attention she was doing.
But Klath didn't let the lack of reaction outwardly affect him, even if inside he felt it had at least deserved some sort of acknowledgement. Instead, he stepped towards his troops and gestured to the items that were laid out in front of them.
"I ask you all now to pick up your weapons."
Each of them reached down to retrieve a different type of bladed implement. Klath had been extra careful to tailor the weapon to the individual that would wield it, as all good generals should.
Jirel held up a small serrated kut'luch dagger. Klath was sure that the smaller weapon would suit the sort of close combat that the Trill usually preferred.
Jirel himself looked a tad unhappy at the size of the weapon in his hand, especially compared to some of the others on display. But he decided to keep the dozens of quips that jumped to mind to himself, trying his best to respect the serious way his friend was treating their situation. Even if he couldn't quite bring himself to understand it.
Denella picked up her trusty Orion dagger, an identical copy of the one she had been given by her mother as a youngster, and one that she'd had plenty of reason to use since she had joined up with the Bounty's crew.
She hefted the weapon with practised ease, and while Klath could have assigned her a dagger from his own personal collection, he knew that her familiarity with her own blade would be crucial in the coming assault. And he knew how adept she was at using it.
Natasha reluctantly picked up the mek'leth that lay in front of her. She looked at it like it was an affront to everything she believed in.
Klath had thought long and hard about which weapon to assign to her, before opting for the larger blade. He saw that as offering her the greatest chance to cause damage despite her relative lack of experience with bladed combat.
Still, as he looked at the way she was unhappily regarding the blade, and her persistent scowl, he feared that even those carefully laid plans may not be enough. He expected to lose her early once the battle began in earnest.
Finally, Sunek grabbed the d'k tahg knife that had been placed in front of him and quickly threw out a few sloppy practice thrusts and parries into the thin air in front of him.
Klath had opted for an all-rounder of a weapon for the Vulcan for simplicity's sake. But watching the painted-up man playfight with it in the cargo bay, he realised that even given that, he was going to have to set his targets particularly low for Sunek not to disappoint him.
Still, with everyone now dutifully armed and ready for action, Klath joined them by grabbing his trusty bat'leth from the sheath behind his back and gracefully wielding it in a flowing series of smooth, well-practised motions using the skills he had honed in the Klingon Defence Force.
Proud of his speech, and his impromptu bat'leth demonstration, he turned back to the disorganised line of soldiers in front of him. Sunek had idly started picking his nose.
Seeing Klath's annoyed look, and wanting to do what she could to rescue the situation, Denella quickly stepped forwards, holding up her dagger, puffing her chest out and filling her mouth with as much phlegm as physically possible.
"Heghlu'meH QaQ jajvam!" she barked out in her best approximation of the Klingon language.
She remained proudly at exaggerated attention as she looked over at Klath, suppressing the wince from another twinge in her back. The Klingon's mouth curved into a slight smile as he nodded back at her, respecting her words and her effort, if not her pronunciation.
Alongside the Orion engineer, Jirel leaned across and muttered at her with some amusement.
"Way to suck up, Lieutenant Suck-Up."
Denella made a face back at the Trill, as Klath turned around and led his troops towards the rear ramp of the Bounty. There wasn't a moment to lose.
After all, their shift was about to start.
'*'*'
'*'*'
The Bounty was parked on the third moon of Mentok colony.
The colony itself was a loose agglomeration of settlements and outposts spread out across the habitable planets and moons of the Mentok system, some distance outside the Klingon Empire's vast borders.
They had arrived after receiving a request for immediate assistance that had been broadcast out across all local shipping lanes. One that Klath had found impossible to resist. Because the third moon of Mentok III had a problem. An infestation of polygeminus grex. Or, to give them their more affectionate name, tribbles.
The call had come from Mortath, an exiled Klingon who appeared to serve as the informal leading figure of the colony. His position of exile from the Empire was common across all of the Klingons in the system. And was also an unwanted status shared by Klath, who carried the weight of his own discommendation every day of his life.
His exile, coupled with his life onboard the Bounty, meant that Klath rarely had an opportunity to indulge in his old Klingon ways. Which meant that, as soon as the Bounty had picked up Mortath's message, he had pretty much demanded that they join the hunt.
In truth, even Klath knew that it wasn't all that much of a hunt. But it was the Klingon way, dating all the way back to the era of General K'Vusk. After all, even tribbles deserved the honour of dying in combat.
And so the tribble hunt on the third moon of Mentok III had been organised. Teams of Klingon residents from across the system, alongside merchant crews like the Bounty that had answered the call to arms, worked in shift patterns around the clock to cut down every last one of the enemy scourge and eradicate the infestation for good.
As the Bounty's crew descended down the ship's rear ramp onto the dark brown expanse of the terraformed scrubland that made up most of the moon's surface, they saw the previous shift making their way from the battlefield.
Around a dozen Klingons, their armour coated in blood, carried heavy sacks filled with the bodies of those they had slain over their backs. Even though the combat had been as one-sided as anyone would have expected, Klath still found that he felt a curious sense of pride as he watched the weary but satisfied warriors returning home, a feeling that he hadn't felt for a long time.
It wasn't a feeling shared by everyone present.
"Disgusting," Natasha tutted from behind him.
Her latest complaints, like all of her previous complaints she had voiced all the way to them arriving at Mentok colony, fell on a collection of deaf ears. Still, she looked over at Jirel and persisted.
"You're really gonna do this? You're really gonna spend the whole evening out here murdering innocent animals?"
"Of course not," the Trill replied patiently, "Our shift's only for four hours."
Her unhappy glare ratcheted up several more notches. Jirel did his best not to notice, and kept his kut'luch primed and ready for action.
"You know what I mean," she shot back, "I can't believe you're all just going to go along with this…this slaughter!"
"Hey, this is important to Klath. And if it's important to him, then it's important to us. You know how we do things on the Bounty by now. What is it we say? One for all, and all for one?"
"You're not a musketeer, Jirel," she sighed with her deepest of withering tones, "You're a delivery man. You say things like 'Yes, of course we can get that to you by the end of the week', or 'No, I'm definitely not a musketeer'."
"Yeah, well, suck it up. Cos for the next four hours, I'm a stone cold tribble killing machine-"
Klath brought the latest round of bickering between the Bounty's captain and doctor to an end with a sudden sharp grunt. He stopped on the spot and gestured for the rest of the group to halt.
He sniffed the air, as he felt the blood lust beginning to rise inside of him. The enemy was near. He could sense it.
He gestured over to a dense patch of scrubland ahead of them, and crept onwards, raising his weapon up in front of him. The rest of the Bounty's crew followed in his wake.
The hunt was on.
'*'*'
'*'*'
"That…was awesome."
A thoroughly exhausted Sunek staggered back over to the rear ramp of the Bounty, dragging two heavy cloth sacks along the ground behind him. His loaned d'k tahg was tucked into his belt, blood still visibly covering the blade.
Denella was already standing by the ramp, her dagger wiped clean and placed back in its sheath at her waist. Her oversized overalls were spattered with blood, and she had a bulging sack of her own down at her feet.
Both of them were thoroughly dishevelled after four hours on the battlefield. The third moon of Mentok III was a humid environment, even in the late evening, and Denella's face was streaked with sweat, her frazzled hair loosely bunched behind her head. And while Sunek's physiology meant that he had no such issues with sweat, his unruly mane of hair was even more unkempt than usual, and his painstakingly applied camouflage makeup was now streaked with dust and dirt from the moon's terrain. Nevertheless, they both looked proud of their efforts during their shift.
"I mean," Sunek continued, "It was also kinda really super gross. But totally awesome."
Denella nodded back, wiping a dusty hand across her tired face.
"Yeah. Not exactly the most challenging fight I've ever had, but it turns out a tribble hunt is a great way to work off a few frustrations. Makes up for missing yesterday's meditation session, I guess?"
Sunek nodded awkwardly. He still preferred to keep their sessions, and the deeper emotional issues he'd been suffering from the last few months, a secret. He didn't like it when things got serious.
He glanced down at the knife in his hand and recalled the last time he had wielded a similar weapon, when a sudden blind rage had seen him nearly kill a defenceless and defeated outlaw on Nimbus III.
Before he could properly respond, they heard footsteps approaching, and turned to see Natasha arriving back at the Bounty. She was still scowling deeply, her weapon was clean of any sign of blood, and she wasn't carrying anything else with her.
"Hey," Sunek said, gesturing to her lack of possessions, 'You're supposed to bag up all your kills, doc. Otherwise they don't count towards our payment."
She tossed the unused mek'leth onto the dusty ground in front of her and folded her arms across her chest in protest.
"There was nothing to bag up. Because I didn't kill any poor tribbles. I just went for a four hour hike instead. And the worst part is that it turns out this is a very, very boring moon!"
Sunek and Denella glanced at each other, then looked back at the gently simmering doctor.
"You know why we're here, right?" Sunek asked with a slight grin, all his worries about his emotional secrets having vanished now there was a chance to wind up his colleague.
"Yes!" Natasha snapped, "And as I've repeatedly told you, I'm not going to be a party to any of it! Because I'm some sort of psychopath who wants to spend their time butchering innocent creatures with a big stupid sword!"
Denella and Sunek looked at each other again. Sunek could see from the amused twinkle in the green-skinned woman's eye that she was up for joining in with the fun.
"I had a knife," Sunek pointed out to the doctor with a shrug.
"Dagger here," Denella added.
Natasha sighed in exasperation, her increasing sense of righteous indignation clouding her from the clear fact that she was being so entirely wound up.
"You know what I mean. I had a sword, at least."
She paused and looked down at the stubby mek'leth on the ground, seeming less sure of herself all of a sudden.
"At least, I think that's a sword-? Hang on, this is wildly not the point! The point is-!"
"Come on," Jirel's voice sounded out from behind her, "Not a single one? Really?"
The group turned to see the tired Trill staggering over to them with two sacks full of kills on his back. Alongside him, Klath carried four full sacks on his own back without breaking sweat. As they arrived and dropped their cargo onto the ground, Jirel gestured to the complete lack of evidence of any kills around Natasha's own feet.
"You couldn't even have found one or two that had died of natural causes and claimed them for the sake of it?"
She glared back at the Trill, who met her look with a disarming lop-sided grin.
Klath ignored the latest round of bickering entirely, and focused on the positives of their situation, looking around at their combined tribble haul with satisfaction.
"A fine hunt," he said with a proud nod, "We have done well."
Jirel clocked the single sack at Denella's feet and gestured to it with the bloodied knife in his hand.
"Just the one bag, Denella? Kinda lame for the big wannabe Klingon."
The Orion raised an eyebrow and gestured over to the other side of the Bounty's ramp, where five further sacks of tribbles were standing.
"Wanna do a recount?"
She addressed the question as much to Klath as she did to the Trill, glancing at the Klingon in a manner not dissimilar to an eager daughter fishing for her father's validation. She received another proud nod from Klath for her troubles, along with a slightly annoyed look from Jirel.
"You know," he muttered at her smiling face, "Smugness is a very bad look for you."
Denella ignored his comment, choosing instead to revel in her smugness for a few moments longer, even as Klath gestured back up the Bounty's ramp.
"We should clean up," he offered, "Mortath has invited us to dine in his residence tonight."
Leaving the chance for further bickering behind, Jirel regarded his friend with no small amount of curiosity. He had been acting like a new man ever since the Bounty had responded to Mortath's open transmission.
Although the message requesting assistance had come from a disgraced Klingon, Klath had instantly treated it with the utmost sincerity. Even when the details of the request became clear and it turned out to be a need for some glorified pest control.
Still, while it might not have been the most epic of tasks for a warrior, the Bounty's weapons chief had treated it with the utmost seriousness throughout.
"So," Jirel offered, "What's this Mortath guy's deal, anyway? How come he found himself out here in the heady, tribble-infested hinterlands?"
Klath stifled a slight grimace before he responded.
"It is…not proper for Klingons to discuss the reasons for their discommendation. I do not know the details. And none of you should ask for them. If you wish to make it through dinner."
He suppressed the urge to glance at Sunek as he talked about discommendations. Of all of the Bounty's crew, the Vulcan was the only one who knew the details of his own exile from the Empire, thanks to a vengeful and particularly talkative Klingon that he and Klath had crossed paths with some months ago. The Vulcan had promised to keep it all a secret, and so far he seemed to have stayed true to his word. Still, he certainly wouldn't have been Klath's first choice of confidant.
Instead of dwelling on that unhappy matter any further, he retrieved his mek'leth from the ground where Natasha had dropped it and moved towards the ramp, even as the doctor's protests started up again.
"Ugh! Seriously, everyone needs to look at what they're doing here. These things are defenceless animals, and-"
"They are a menace," Klath interjected forcefully, pausing midway up the ramp, "A plague. They destroy crops, obliterate entire planets of any useful produce and condemn other life to famine and hunger. This was an honourable battle."
"Really?" Natasha persisted, "How many bat'leths did the tribbles have?"
Klath didn't respond to this latest comment, apart from grumbling unhappily under his breath and starting back up the ramp towards his cabin.
"Seriously," Jirel sighed at Natasha as the Klingon departed, "There wasn't one course on 'letting it go' at Starfleet Academy? Even a beginner one?"
"I know you all know I'm right, deep down," she retorted, "This is all completely inhumane."
"Um," Denella interjected, gesturing to her green skin, "Not a human?"
"Yeah," Sunek chimed in as he pointed to himself, the Orion and the Trill, "Read the room, maybe?"
Natasha rolled her eyes, once again allowing her righteousness to cloud her ability to see that her colleagues were successfully winding her up for a second time.
"Bad choice of words, but you know what I mean," she persisted, "And while we're on this stupid - and I'll stress this again: very boring - moon, I'm not going anywhere near any tribbles!"
She folded her arms and stared back at the other three with defiance. Denella merely offered a knowing shrug as she turned to start up the ramp.
"Fair enough," she called back, "But I have to warn you, you're gonna really hate supper…"
'*'*'
'*'*'
The bowl of raw tribble meat was set down in front of her by a stout Klingon woman, who smiled a toothy grin as she did so.
Natasha looked down at the bloody mess in the bowl and suppressed a sudden rush of nausea. She had seen far worse sights during her often perilous career in Starfleet without so much as flinching, but apparently her usual hardy nature drew the line at this particular piece of Klingon cuisine.
The Bounty's crew had cleaned up and headed for the main residence of the estate. Mortath's own home, located on the outskirts of the main settlement on the southern hemisphere of the moon.
It was a large building, a towering stone-clad complex that had definitely been built in the style of most of the buildings back on Qo'noS, even if the building's main resident was an exile. And despite the lowly status of Mortath, and of every other Klingon throughout the colony, he still appeared to be a traditional Klingon in all other respects. A claim that was backed up by the lavish feast that had been laid on in his main banqueting hall, complete with raucous conversation and a never-ending supply of bloodwine.
Not to mention, all the raw tribble meat anyone could wish for.
In truth, there was very little meat actually on a tribble. The majority of the body mass of each creature comprised an indigestible reproductive system, leaving precious little nutrition elsewhere. This was the primary reason that efforts to farm tribbles in the mid-23rd century as a protein resource for long-range colonisation projects had been swiftly abandoned. The colonists found that they expended far more grain and pulses in feeding the tribbles than they got back in edible meat.
Still, the infestation on Mentok colony was severe enough to keep everyone's plates full for at least one evening.
"'IwlIj jachjaj!"
It wasn't clear which of the Klingons at the table had called out this time, but even those members of the Bounty's crew with no real training in conversational Klingonese had quickly caught onto what the shrill call meant. Around the table, everyone grabbed their goblets of bloodwine and took a generous gulp in candid celebration, breaking up the meal completely.
Natasha wasn't especially unhappy about the interruption, given the food on offer. But the apparent need to propose a new toast, seemingly apropos of nothing, every few seconds, coupled with the fact that she hadn't had a thing to eat since lunchtime, meant that she was quickly getting a little tipsy.
Next to her, Sunek stared down at his own plate of pungent nourishment. For the first time since he had turned his back on Vulcan traditions and embraced his wilder side as a member of the V'tosh ka'tur, he wondered if it was too late to return to a vegetarian diet.
Further down, Jirel toyed unhappily with his own portion, taking another long slug of bloodwine to try and summon up enough Dutch courage to actually take a bite and not quite getting there.
Next to him, Denella looked at her own repast and gritted her teeth, significantly more determined than the others to make a good impression. For Klath's sake, if nothing else.
Opposite her, the Klingon woman that had served them sat and chewed on a mouthful of meat, regarding the four unhappy Bounty crew members with an amused leer.
"Not hungry?" she offered with a mocking tone, "Or perhaps we could prepare something a little milder? We have plenty of children's food in storage, I believe."
She punctuated her comment with a derisive laugh, one shared by several other Klingons around the table.
Hackles sufficiently raised, Denella stared back at the woman. Then she reached down with her hand, grabbed a large portion of the slippery mass on her plate and, to the horror of her watching colleagues, shoved it into her mouth without a second thought.
She chewed noisily on the mouthful of raw tribble meat, and put all of her energy into trying to ignore the fact that she was currently chewing noisily on a mouthful of raw tribble meat. Finally, she forced herself to swallow the whole thing.
"Delicious," she called back across the table, theatrically licking her fingers for good measure, "But it could use a little more, what's the word…la'yIgh."
The leer from the Klingon woman switched from one of disdain to one of grudging respect, even as the other three Bounty crew members grew a little paler. She nodded back at Denella, as she gamely swallowed the last remnants of her mouthful and grabbed her goblet of bloodwine.
"'IwlIj jachjaj!" she called out.
She took a long slug of her drink, simply to get the taste of the food out of her mouth, as the rest of the guests around the table mirrored her impromptu toast.
At the head of the table, Klath watched the Orion engineer's efforts with a small amount of pride.
As soon as they had arrived at the lavish banqueting hall, which was decked out in a similarly extravagant Klingon style to the building's exterior, complete with carved stone arches and a huge dining table complete with long communal benches on each side, Mortath had beckoned for Klath to leave his crewmates and join him by his side.
Mortath was a Klingon of advancing age, and one whose most glorious days were clearly behind him, discommendation or no discommendation. His grey hair and portly frame were testament to that, and also testament to his appetite, which he had shown off during the four portions of tribble meat that he had consumed so far.
Klath sat to his left along one side of the table. To Mortath's right sat his son and daughter, Karn and K'Veth. Both had acknowledged Klath when they had been introduced, but both had left the lion's share of the conversation to their father.
Mortath himself had picked up on Denella's display further down the table, and the look of pride in Klath's eyes, and chuckled heartily, slapping the younger Klingon on the back for effect.
"Ah," the rotund Klingon grunted, "Some very interesting company you're keeping, Klath."
Klath looked back at his welcoming host and nodded.
"They are a…memorable crew."
Mortath chuckled again, shovelling another dripping handful of meat into his mouth and gesturing for someone to pass him one of the communal platters on the table in order to load up his fifth portion of supper.
"I must say," he said as he worked, "It was good to see a fellow Klingon answer my call and join us for such a great hunt. The other merchant crews that have come will do their duties out there, but it takes a Klingon warrior to really appreciate the glory of victory."
Klath looked at the elderly Klingon, and took in the sight of the others down the length of both sides of the banquet table. This was, he noted with a touch of regret, the most of his own people that he had been with since that fateful day in the chambers of the High Council, when his shameful fate had been sealed, as each council member had turned their back on him in turn. His punishment for his actions in the Tygon Nebula, and the beginning of his exile.
He shook those thoughts away and tried to focus on the here and now.
"It is an honour to be a part of your hunt," he responded to Mortath, truthfully.
Mortath's broad smile slipped slightly at this comment, and Klath noted that both Karn and K'Veth looked down at their own plates in unison.
"Yes," Mortath managed eventually, "Well, there might not be a lot of honour for those of us on Mentok colony as far as the High Council is concerned, but I do my best to make sure we keep the traditions alive. We still live as Klingons."
Klath looked around the banquet hall again and nodded in satisfaction.
"I can see," he replied appreciatively, "It feels good to be here."
As he said this and turned back to the master of the house, his eyes momentarily glanced at K'Veth, before he looked away when he saw that she was looking right back at him.
Mortath didn't pick up on that, but his smile did return to full strength as a result of his guest's words, and he slapped Klath on the back again for good measure.
"You know, even now I have more hunting parties out across the plains, eradicating our enemy. With luck, and thanks in no small part to you and your…memorable crew, we will be completely victorious any day now."
At this, Karn grabbed his goblet and held it aloft.
"'IwlIj jachjaj!"
As Klath downed a generous mouthful as part of the latest toast, he nearly choked himself when he heard the sound from the other end of the table.
Natasha hadn't intended her scoff to be quite as audible as it had been. But due to the amount of potent Klingon alcohol she had been imbibing on what remained a very empty stomach, it had come out loudly enough for the entire room to hear.
The previous cheery and raucous atmosphere was silenced in an instant, as everyone else at the table turned to regard the human doctor. At the head of the table, Mortath coughed unhappily and set his latest handful of tribble meat back down onto his overflowing plate.
"You have something to say, Doctor Kinsen of the Bounty?"
"Uh oh…" Sunek muttered with an amused raise of his eyebrow.
Under the gaze of a dozen or more Klingon warriors, Natasha couldn't help but squirm slightly. It didn't take a body language expert to suggest that she might have overstepped the mark.
"Um," she managed, somewhat self-consciously, "I, ah, just meant-"
"Hey," Jirel jumped in, gamely trying to steer the conversation elsewhere by gesturing to his plate of food, "What's the, um, recipe for this, by the way? Cos it is…something else."
The stout Klingon woman sitting opposite him at the table shrugged her broad shoulders.
"We skin the beasts with the blades of our daggers while their bodies are still warm. Then we flay the flesh from the carcass, and serve it dripping in its own blood."
Fully furnished with the details of the recipe, the Trill's face looked even paler under his spots as he mustered the weakest of nods back across the table.
"Huh," he managed eventually, "And, so, does this come with, like, a salad, or…?"
A satisfied smile spread across the Klingon woman's face.
"Do not kill an animal unless you intend to eat it," she replied, as she scooped up another mouthful of flesh with her heavy fingers.
Jirel's distraction, such that it had been, entirely ran out of steam amidst another wave of nausea passing through the Trill. Throughout the little exchange, Mortath had kept his attention squarely on Natasha.
"You were saying, Doctor Kinsen? No need to be shy. We are all friends here."
Natasha had some slight doubts about that particular statement, but before she could attempt some sort of appeasing response, Karn jumped in from Mortath's side.
"She was in Starfleet," the significantly more brash Klingon spat out dismissively, "It is thanks to her and her people that we are being forced to deal with this plague all over again!"
She flinched slightly, recalling the now-infamous story of how tribbles were reintroduced into the galaxy, an entirely unplanned result of a dangerous trip back through time by the crew of the USS Defiant several years ago.
Until that point, the Klingon Empire had successfully and entirely eradicated the species of polygeminus grex, in a long struggle that had culminated in General K'Vusk's mission to Iota Geminorum IV.
Their unfortunate reintroduction was an incident that didn't just cause a stir in the world of Temporal Investigations. It had also caused a diplomatic incident between the Federation and the Empire, just when the Klingon-Federation War was reaching its height. Chancellor Gowron himself suggested that the reintroduction of tribbles was a form of temporal warfare against his people.
Things had been smoothed over eventually thanks to a herculean diplomatic effort, but the cork was out of the bottle, tribble-wise.
"That was an accident-" Natasha began to explain.
"Pah!" Karn spat, standing and jabbing a finger down the table at her, "The same excuse we always hear. But we all know that this menace was brought back deliberately. A Starfleet trick-!"
"Karn," Mortath growled from the head of the table, "Another time, perhaps."
The younger Klingon snarled unhappily at his father's intervention. But he acquiesced to his wishes nonetheless.
An uncomfortable silence descended on proceedings. Once again, Klath found that his gaze had drifted over to K'Veth. And once again, he immediately looked away as soon as she saw that he was staring at her.
Despite his reaction, she grabbed her goblet and raised it high in the air, electing to end the silence in a manner that was in keeping with the broad theme of the meal so far.
"'IwlIj jachjaj!"
'*'*'
'*'*'
The blade of the bat'leth swung through the air, missing her by inches.
She spun back around on her toes and brought her own blade down in a tight arc, the two heavy metal weapons impacting in a shower of sparks.
Not for the first time since the fight had begun, Denella regretted indulging in quite so much bloodwine last night.
The two bat'leths remained locked together, as their respective owners desperately strained against each other. She felt beads of sweat on her forehead from the effort she was having to put in just to maintain her position, and she grimaced with exertion as she stared across at her opponent.
On the other side of the bat'leths, Karn seemed more at ease with the situation. He smiled back at her, using his brute strength to force her own weapon down towards the ground.
The Orion shook off the fog on her brain and focused on her predicament. Realising that Karn was likely to overpower her in their current position, she broke away from the bind, wrenching her blade away from his and whirling backwards at the same time, causing him to falter slightly as he was caught off-balance. He quickly recovered his footing, however, and swung his blade around at her again, forcing her to swiftly parry the blow in another burning shower of sparks.
This wasn't exactly how she'd been planning to spend her morning, but she'd woken to find that she and Klath had been invited to join some of the colonists in a session of light morning training. And Klath had been very insistent that they accept the offer.
It was the honourable response, after all.
And so, slightly groggy and more than slightly hungover, she found herself thrown into the midst of a particularly frantic duel with Mortath's own son, wielding a weapon that she wasn't especially used to wielding. While Klath had given her some rudimentary training with it, she preferred the familiarity of her own Orion dagger when it came to bladed weapons.
Still, thanks to everything else she had learned during her sparring sessions with Klath back on the Bounty, she was managing to improvise enough to hold her own. She parried another swing from her opponent, and spun away across the wide expanse of the training area inside Mortath's compound to set herself for the next inevitable attack. Feeling her arms starting to ache, she opted to alter her tactics.
It was clear that the bulky Klingon had her beaten in terms of brute strength. But then, so did Klath, and she more than held her own against him during their sparring. She knew that power was rarely all it was cracked up to be, provided she knew when to improvise.
Karn charged at her once again, a whirlwind of snarling teeth and Klingon energy racing towards her across the stone floor, bat'leth raised in anger.
She tensed, then at the last second, she dived away from the incoming blade, while simultaneously sweeping her trailing leg up and across Karn's path.
The Klingon, taken entirely by surprise, tripped over her outstretched limb with enough momentum to topple clean over onto the ground. Before he had a chance to right himself, Denella sprung back to her feet and brought her bat'leth's blade down towards his prone form, the sharp leading edge of the blade stopping a scant few millimetres from Karn's exposed neck.
She looked down at her defeated opponent and smiled with satisfaction.
"Very good!"
The voice of Mortath came from behind her. But she didn't turn around and acknowledge the comment until Karn had definitively conceded with an angry nod.
Mortath stood by the side of the room, flanked by Klath and K'Veth, forming a small but clearly appreciative audience for the fight that had just unfolded.
"You fight as well as a Klingon," the elderly Mortath continued with further appreciation.
Denella mustered a nod back at the group, still panting from the exertion of the fight. She held out a hand to help Karn back to his feet, but the somewhat humiliated Klingon forced himself back up without her assistance.
"Fight better than some of them," the Orion couldn't help but grin.
"That was a cheap trick," Karn snarled back at her, "I should have known you would not fight like a warrior-!"
"She fought properly," Klath interjected sternly, "You left yourself wide open to such a counterattack by charging in as you did. Have the courage to admit your mistakes."
Karn scowled even more deeply at this, seemingly prepared to admit nothing. Instead, he grabbed his bat'leth from the ground and skulked away towards the exit.
To Mortath's side, K'Veth looked over at Klath, who felt the intensity of her gaze on him and did his best to try not to acknowledge the look, nor the stirring sensation inside of him.
"Perhaps our other guest wants to show his own skills?" she offered, "I would…be honoured to spar with you."
It seemed as close as a Klingon could get to flirting without resorting to violence, and it caused Klath to shift uncomfortably on his feet, suddenly keenly aware of how warm it was inside this particular room of Mortath's compound.
"Not now, K'Veth," Mortath grunted amiably, patting Klath on the shoulder, "I have much to discuss with Klath. Perhaps you wish to pit your skills against…our champion."
K'Veth nodded, trying not to let her disappointment show, before grabbing her own bat'leth from a wooden bench at the side of the room and striding out towards Denella. The Orion winced, still feeling the combined effects of her exertions against Karn, and also her exertions from last night's feast. But she knew it wouldn't be honourable to decline such a request. So she forced herself back up straight, held up her bat'leth, and bowed her head at her opponent.
As the next sparring contest began in earnest, Mortath smiled and shook his head, before leading Klath over to the corner of the room to talk more privately.
"A Klingon warrior teaching an Orion Slave Girl the ways of the Empire," the grey-haired Klingon chuckled, "This galaxy never ceases to surprise me."
Klath looked back at the fight, just as Denella parried yet another blow, and again forced himself not to spend too long watching K'Veth, turning back to Mortath instead and shaking his head.
"She is not a slave girl," Klath corrected him.
"No. She is your student."
"She is my colleague."
Mortath considered this correction for a moment.
"Still," he offered back, "You seem to have taught her a lot."
"I taught her very little. I merely helped to hone that which she already knew."
"Huh," Mortath grunted appreciably, "Spoken like a true warrior. Even after all this time."
Klath felt his jaw clench slightly at the sudden reminder of his discommendation, which he had briefly been able to forget about in his familiar Klingon-style surroundings. But he kept himself outwardly impassive.
"Regardless of what the High Council may have done to my name," he replied, "I still do my best to maintain my personal sense of honour. And my people's traditions."
Mortath glanced back over at the bat'leth-wielding Orion, then back at Klath. He nodded.
"Yes. You do, don't you. You even came all this way, with your…memorable crew. To help rid me of the menace that had blighted this moon."
Klath felt a surge of pride at the memory of yesterday's hunt. Enough to distract him from the Klingon woman on the other side of the room.
"I would have done the same for any Klingon," he replied.
"I'm sure you would."
Mortath paused for a second, as the sound of crashing blades continued elsewhere, before he elected to continue.
"Tell me, Klath, what would you say if I told you I might have something for you, and your sense of honour? Something more than killing pests for latinum. A way back into the Empire?"
"I would strike you down for mocking me," Klath responded, entirely truthfully.
Mortath chuckled again at his candour, and patted in on the shoulder again.
"Of course," he nodded, "But, if you would keep your blade on your back for a moment, you might allow me to explain myself."
Klath allowed his host to do just that. And once he was done with his explanation, his blade remained on his back.
'*'*'
'*'*'
Jirel groaned in pain, as if every weapon in Mortath's residence had been simultaneously plunged into his stomach. As he lay on the single bed of the Bounty's tiny medical bay, Natasha ran a battered old tricorder over him and shot the groaning Trill a smug look.
"I know what you're gonna say," he managed to cough out, "But I was just trying to be a gracious guest."
Her smug smile remained in place as she double checked the readings.
"Well," she casually replied, despite the suffering her queasy patient was going through, "At least now we know the effect that raw tribble meat has on a Trill's metabolism."
"Ugh. I just assumed we were made of sterner stuff. We're designed to share our bellies with a great big slug, after all."
Natasha raised an amused eyebrow as she paced over to the stock of medicines she had available and started to mix up a hypospray.
"They could have at least cooked it," Jirel continued to grumble as she worked.
"Why would they do that? When have you ever known Klath to cook anything?"
She turned back with the prepared hypospray and put on her best impression of Klath's deep, booming voice.
"To cook the meat," she grunted, "Is to lose all of the flavour."
She chucked to herself at the strength of the impression as she strode back over to the bed, where Jirel wasn't smiling back.
"Whatever," he muttered, gesturing at the hypospray, "That gonna fix my stomach?"
"Should do. Anti-nausea shot for the effects, analgesic for the irritation. Although, I'm not really sure you deserve it. Given how you only got yourself into this mess in the first place by killing a bunch of defenceless-"
"Nat, I swear, I cannot hear that speech again right now. Please, first do no harm?"
"Fine," she sighed, reluctantly pressing the hypospray into his neck with a hiss.
He nodded in thanks and took a few moments for the remedy to settle him down. As he waited, they both heard the distinctive sounds of activity from elsewhere onboard.
"What the hell is that?" the Trill muttered, stepping down off the bed with a grimace.
The two of them exited the medical bay and walked down the Bounty's single main corridor towards the source of the noise, which was coming from the Ju'Day-type raider's cargo bay.
They arrived to find two unfamiliar Klingons from Mentok colony placing the latest of several large wooden crates down on the deck and securing them in place. There was a telltale clinking of glass bottles from inside.
"What's all this?" Jirel asked the nearest Klingon with genuine confusion.
"Bloodwine," he replied simply, before walking back down the rear ramp with his colleague.
"Ask a stupid question."
Seeing Klath standing with Mortath on the other side of the pile of crates, Jirel and Natasha approached them, hoping for a slightly more complete explanation.
"Hey, Klath," Jirel offered with a grin, "Planning a party?"
"Planning a mission," he replied in all seriousness, handing the Trill a small rust-brown padd.
Jirel and Natasha looked at the details on the padd, still entirely confused, even as Mortath explained the details of the Bounty's latest delivery job.
"Sixteen crates of vintage bloodwine from my very own cellar. The 2349 vintage, to be precise. A quite exceptional year. And this is all bound for a private residence on Brexis II, just a few sectors away from here."
Jirel saw the delivery information on the padd and looked up at Klath with surprise.
"Um, according to this, Brexis II is inside the Empire's boundaries. You sure that's…ok?"
Klath's face tightened slightly, but he nodded back.
"I suggested that Klath take on this mission," Mortath continued, "The delivery is for Toran, son of Kradon. He is one of the newest members of the High Council. And he very much appreciates a good bloodwine."
Jirel kept his focus on Klath, feeling like he was missing a big piece of the jigsaw. Especially now their task had been instantly upgraded from a trip inside the Klingon Empire to a trip to a High Council member's own residence. Klath could see the dozens of questions written across his long-time friend's face, begrudgingly feeling that he had to acknowledge it.
"I will…explain later. Once the rest of the cargo is aboard."
The Trill watched as the two Klingons from before marched back up the Bounty's loading ramp with another crate of bloodwine and sighed.
"Damn right, you will."
'*'*'
'*'*'
There was a slight delay after the cargo was loaded before they could get underway.
As per standard requirements during a tribble infestation, the Bounty was being subjected to a thorough pre-flight check and decontamination process by Mortath's men, to ensure that there was no trace of polygeminus grex onboard. Not even a stray hair. Which gave the Bounty's crew ample time to gather around the table in the ship's dining area and wait for Klath's promised explanation. The Klingon still didn't want to get into too many details, but he also knew that he owed his colleagues something.
"It is Mortath's idea," he began, "Toran is a younger and somewhat…liberal member of the High Council. But also an increasingly influential voice inside the Empire. The bloodwine is for a gathering of other council members he is hosting at his private residence in a few days."
"But," Denella sighed from across the table, "Why you?"
Klath squirmed slightly in his chair before reluctantly continuing, wondering just how much of an explanation he would have to provide to satisfy the unspoken social contract at play.
"Toran has developed a reputation for being willing to reassess past discommendations. He is a firm believer that the High Council has often been too rash and quick to hand out such an extreme punishment in the past. And that the reasoning is often inconsistent and flawed."
"Huh," Sunek quipped as he leaned back in his chair, "Klingons acting too rashly? You think you know a guy…"
"Shut up, Sunek," Jirel sighed, his focus still on Klath, "So, what? You bring this guy some free booze and he just lets you off?"
Klath felt his irritation creep higher, felt the walls inside him straining to close up again. But he did his best to power through.
"Not exactly. But Mortath believes it will be enough of a gesture to be granted an audience with him. For me to…argue my case."
"And then what?" the Trill persisted.
"Then, if Toran believes my cause to be honourable, and my punishment worthy of reassessment, he will discuss it with the rest of the council. And then…"
He tailed off. On the other side of the table, Denella smiled at her friend and nodded.
"And then you can go home."
Jirel felt himself inwardly flinch at that, suddenly realising what his closest friend was talking about. Klath, for his part, just nodded back at the Orion engineer.
"You really think you have a case?"
To everyone's surprise, the question came from Sunek. Klath glared at the Vulcan, who offered him a knowing look back that reminded the Klingon that the Bounty's pilot was the only one onboard who knew the details about his discommendation.
He fought back the desire to try and ignore that comment, to try and distance himself from what the Vulcan knew. But instead, he felt compelled to respond.
"Yes, I believe we do."
"Huh," Sunek muttered to himself, "Holy crap."
As the gathered throng around the table took in everything that Klath had told them, it took a moment for the specific grammar of his final comment to register. When it did, it was Natasha who got to the follow-up question first.
"Who's 'we'?"
'*'*'
'*'*'
Karn and K'Veth stood patiently in the entrance hall of their father's residence, as Mortath strode over to them, returning from the Bounty.
"You are both ready to leave?" the older Klingon grunted at his offspring.
"Everything will go according to plan," Karn nodded, fixing his father with a determined glare, "Be sure of that, father."
"We will do everything you have asked," K'Veth added, looking a little more wary.
Mortath nodded back in satisfaction. He had made a personal request to Klath that, along with the cargo of bloodwine, he also bring along his son and daughter to Brexis II, so that they might argue their own cases with Toran.
Or, at least, that was the story that he had given to the other Klingon. There was no need to give him any reason to suspect that there might be anything else to the delivery.
"Just make sure the delivery is completed," Mortath added, "And that Toran receives…all of the cargo."
The siblings nodded again, before turning and marching off towards the waiting Bounty.
Mortath watched them walk away, and allowed himself a satisfied smile.