Section 31_ Rogue - Andy Mangels [42]
Zweller felt the thin rime of hoarfrost crunching beneath his boots as he walked across a featureless, rock-strewn plain. The air smelled of ozone, giving it a burned quality that belied its bitter chill. Despite the layers of clothing separating him from the elements, the wind bit into his flesh with innumerable small razor teeth, numbing his nose and ears. The cold seemed to aggravate the lassitude caused by the planet’s intense gravity. He jammed his gloved hands deeply into his jacket pockets in a vain effort to warm them.
About fifty meters before him sat a squat, frost-encrusted structure, about the size of a Starfleet photon torpedo tube. The apparatus gave off a faint blue glow, which Zweller assumed wasn’t visible from the air; he recognized it as a Romulan cloaking device, probably merely one of many. Doubtless the machine was here courtesy of Koval, and its presence helped explain how the rebels had evaded capture for so long. Though Grelun evidently hadn’t seen fit to conceal the cloaking device from him, Zweller was certain that the blue light surrounding it was a protective forcefield of some kind. He probably wouldn’t be able to damage it even if he wanted to.
Zweller looked upward. The sky was utterly dark, except where small gaps in the omnipresent Nightside haze revealed momentary, random patterns of multicolored light every few seconds. It was an atmospheric conflagration that would have put Earth’s Northern Lights to shame. Zweller tried to guess the rebel base’s exact position-information that Grelun, the Army of Light’s new leader, had yet to divulge to him-but quickly gave up the effort. The atmospheric pyrotechnics gave him no clue; the highly energetic interactions between the solar wind and the planet’s magnetic field made such auroral displays visible from any point on the globe, and would be visible even in the brilliance of Dayside. The rebel compound could be anywhere from just nightward of Chiaros IV’s habitable twilight meridian to one of the poles to the frigid, windswept reaches of the Nightside equator.
A flash of illumination unlike any of the others drew his attention; it resolved quickly into a small point of light that moved almost directly overhead. At first he thought he’d sighted one of the outer Chiarosan planets until he realized that the luminous speck was moving far too rapidly. He followed the light with his eyes for several minutes, until it vanished into the haze on the horizon.
A government patrol ship, Zweller thought. It was right on top of us, but it couldn’t pierce the cloak.
The crackle of a footfall directly behind Zweller interrupted his ruminations. He instantly turned to face the sound, backing away to give himself room to maneuver. A colorful flash from the sky allowed Zweller to recognize Grelun’s dark visage, just a few meters away. For such huge people, these Chiarosans are remarkably stealthy, he thought.
Apparently contemptuous of the elements, Grelun wore only a light jacket over his gray duty uniform. Zweller tried to suppress a shiver and failed.
“You really shouldn’t sneak up on a trained Starfleet officer like that,” Zweller said, pitching his voice only a little louder than the chill winds.
“Do not worry, human,” Grelun said with an inscrutable smile. “You could not have hurt me.”
Anger flared within Zweller’s chest, momentarily banishing the cold. “Let’s hope we never have a reason to test that hypothesis.” For reasons Zweller still couldn’t fathom, Grelun was even more distrustful and xenophobic than his late predecessor, Falhain.
The Chiarosan chuckled dismissively, then glanced skyward. “I see that you are still brooding about your silent ship.”
It was useless to deny it. But it was just as useless to give up hope entirely. “Maybe your subspace receiver isn’t functioning properly,” Zweller said, trying to sound upbeat. “It can’t possibly work as well as the government’s orbital comm system. Maybe Captain Blaylock has been trying to raise me for the past week but can’t cut through