Taking Wing - Michael A. Martin [3]
“Your vigilance is an asset to us, D’Tan,” Spock said to the young man with the weapon. “But as Surak teaches us, there can be no progress without risk.”
That evidently got through to the armed man, who withdrew his weapon and backed away. The operative spared a quick glance over his shoulder, nodding toward Spock’s youthful bodyguard in a manner that he hoped would be taken as nonthreatening and reassuring. He noted the other man’s response: a hard scowl and a still-unholstered disruptor.
The operative fixed his gaze once again upon Spock, a man who had achieved great notoriety back on Vulcan—as well as throughout the Federation and beyond—more than a century earlier. How strange, he thought, that one who never even achieved Kolinahr now represents all of Vulcan here in this forbidding place—and attempts to bring such radical change to both Vulcan and Romulus. He wondered if Spock would have taken on such a task had he attained the pinnacle of logic that the Kolinahr disciplines represented.
Would I have been so foolish to have followed him here had Kolinahr not eluded me also?
“Walk with me, please, Rukath,” Spock said, then abruptly turned to stride more deeply into the rough-hewn cavern that stretched beyond the sewer hatch. The operative immediately fell into step beside the ambassador. He heard the crunch of gravel behind him, as Spock’s followers tailed the pair at a respectful distance. If I really were the Tal Shiar or military intelligence infiltrator these people fear that I am, this mission would surely be a suicide run.
“You must forgive D’Tan,” Spock said.
“There is nothing to forgive, Mr. Ambassador. His caution is understandable. The Tal Shiar’s eyes and ears are everywhere.”
“Indeed. And none of us have forgotten Senator Pardek’s betrayal.”
The operative thought he detected a touch of wistfulness in the ambassador’s tone. Though it was a surprising departure from Vulcan stoicism, he could certainly understand it. Though he had studied Captain Jean-Luc Picard’s reports about Romulus—one of which included Spock’s own observation that reuniting the long-sundered Vulcan and Romulan peoples might take decades or even centuries to come to fruition—it was disappointing to think that Spock’s efforts had yielded so little after eleven years of hard, often perilous work.
As though he had surmised the dark turn the operative’s thoughts had taken, Spock came directly to the point: “Tell me, Rukath: Why have you come to Romulus?”
The operative was not surprised to learn that Starfleet Intelligence might not have briefed Spock thoroughly on his reason for visiting Romulus. Or perhaps Spock was testing him, despite his reassurances to D’Tan.
“I bear an offer from the Federation Council,” the operative said.
Though the cavern’s illumination remained dim, the operative could see Spock’s right eyebrow rise. “And the nature of that offer?”
“The council has decided to give its official endorsement to your agenda of Vulcan-Romulan unification. But both the council and the new president will want you to return to Earth to make a formal report first.”
Spock brought their walk to an abrupt halt. His dark eyes flashed with an almost fanatical intensity. The operative wondered what so many years living among Vulcan’s hyperemotional cousins had done to the ambassador’s emotional disciplines. Had he “gone native”?
“My work is here,” Spock said.
The operative raised a hand in a placating gesture. “You would be returned here, Mr. Ambassador, to resume that work as quickly as possible. After you’ve addressed both the council and the president’s office on your progress.”
Spock turned his gaze downward and stared into the middle distance, a deliberative expression