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Everything made him suspicious. The shivering wind. The click and whistle of music. The pale flickering lights from the street beyond, which caused a bizarre doorway of silver fog in the distance. That was the end of the alley. He wished to be there, so his spine would cease its quaking. This was a bad time to go alone.

As his hunger for the angled light at the end of the alley grew, he realized he was already halfway through. Now he could not turn back safely. He would have to go all the way through. How many steps had brought him to this point? How many were left? Usually he counted his steps. Tonight he had forgotten.

A buffalo mooed in the deep night. He longed to be among them, where the jab of a blade or the lance of a phaser might be blocked by a quick dive behind a furry body. Protection, protection …

The mouth of the alley glowed like battle before him. He wanted to be there. His own heartbeat pounded from his hips to his head with a drum that blinded him to all but the far light and its tinsel curtain of mist.

Step, step, mud, slip, feel absurd, balance, step again—

Suddenly his left knee buckled and shot out from beneath him. His spine screamed as it slammed to the mud-slicked cobblestones. One of them struck the back of his skull, dazing him abruptly and blurring the vision overhead of the tops of the buildings and the gauzy sky.

Then hands—fists—at his throat, dragging him to his feet—he struggled to react, but his hands were tingling from the fall and for a critical instant he couldn’t even find them.

Dizziness spun through his skull and his equilibrium snagged as someone hauled him to his feet—and no one could do that but another Klingon.

In an instant of panic, he clamped his numb arms to his chest, clumsily hoping to protect his vital organs from the blade bite he knew was coming—

But none came.

“Walking alone in the city,” a voice rumbled before his blurred eyes. “Not very wise, Genzha.”

“Worf! You!”

Genzha pressed back against the brick church, wildly thinking that he might be able to use the wall as a brace, but before he could raise hand or knee, or find his own dagger with these numb fingers, his arms were pinioned behind him and clasped with some kind of strap.

Unbidden fear dashed through him as he realized that he was being held down by a professional, trained soldier—a Starfleet-trained soldier.

Surprised that he wasn’t dead yet, Genzha gasped, “But Ugulan is the one! I was watching out for Ugulan! She chose you to do this instead of him?”

“She chose me. A strange universe we live in, where nothing is certain for long.”

“What do you want? I sicken of your gloating!”

“I want you to remain very quiet.” Worf’s breath was hot against Genzha’s ear. “Walk before me, and we’ll talk about who lives until morning, and who dies.”

“Transporter room to Riker.”

“Riker here. Data, what are you doing in the transporter room?”

“The trainee requested that I come here to handle a situation. I am, in turn, requesting your advice.”

“What’ve you got?”

“We accepted a parcel from Mr. Worf, sir, transported from an asteroid breaker, which picked it up from a Torkezzi fuel ship, which evidently received it from a container vessel out of Sindikash.”

“Okay, what’s in the parcel?”

“A very angry Klingon, sir.”

“A Klingon!”

“Yes, sir. Evidently he was drugged until seven hours ago, when he awakened on board the breaker and let his dissatisfaction be known.”

“Did he hurt anybody?”

“Negative, sir, his wrists and ankles were manacled. However he is very loud and no one could get close enough to gag him.”

“Have you got him under control?”

“I succeeded in gagging him, sir.”

“I guess there are advantages to being an android. Why would Worf send us a hogtied Klingon?”

“No idea, sir. We have only a request from Worf that the Klingon be detained in secrecy for an as yet undetermined period of time.”

“Hmmm … all right, we’ll do that, if he wants.”

“Where would you like me to detain the Klingon, sir?