The Battle of Betazed - Charlotte Douglas [76]
Moset nodded. “In spite of the inferiority of these vat-grown soldiers, I made them telepathic.”
Picard’s blood turned cold, but he refused to reveal the horror that chilled him. Faced with a telepathic fighting force, the Federation might never win the war.
“My procedure worked,” Moset crowed, then his exhilaration faded. “But the Jem’Hadar died.”
“They all died?” Picard prodded in a sympathetic tone.
Moset was shaking his head at the frustrating memory. “Every damned one of them. Almost immediately.”
“As a fellow scientist,” Picard said, “I can certainly understand your frustration.” The captain kept his voice even, consoling. “Perhaps you could explain to me why they died?”
And Moset told him.
Chapter Seventeen
I N T RANSPORTER R OOM T WO of the Enterprise, Deanna struggled to keep her emotions under control. A few moments earlier, she had bidden Worf and Miles O’Brien good-bye, and their parting, although guardedly cheerful on the surface, had been underlaid with sadness. With war raging across the quadrant, Deanna didn’t know if she would ever see either of them again. They were sorely needed back on Deep Space 9 and in the front lines.
In addition to the sorrow of parting with friends, the counselor struggled with apprehension over her upcoming visit to the resistance. Although she hadn’t heard from Lwaxana since the invasion of Betazed, she had always assumed her mother and little brother had managed to survive. Once Deanna reached the surface of the planet, she would learn the truth of her family’s fate. Tapping her forehead lightly with her fingertips in the reassuring meditation technique, she concentrated on positive thoughts to ease her inner turmoil.
The transporter room doors opened, and Commander Vaughn strode in, fully recovered from his wound, followed by Will. The color had returned to the older officer’s face, as had the quickness to his stride, but she still sensed an underlying ennui whose cause she’d never been able to identify. Most likely he was tired of the war. Everyone was sick to death of it.
“We’re beaming down with you,” Will said without preamble. “Things are getting bad on the surface. According to the Enterprise sensors, the Jem’Hadar have been busy since Sentok Nor was destroyed. They’re rounding up civilians indiscriminately and having a good number of them shot, probably hoping either to break the resistance, or find it. As far as we can tell, they’ve done neither, but the civilian death toll is rising fast. We don’t have much time.”
Deanna nodded. “Then let’s go.”
“I’m still worried that the Jem’Hadar will detect our transporter beam,” Riker said to Vaughn. “They may not notice it immediately, but they will before long, and then they could home in on the resistance stronghold.”
“Can’t be helped,” Vaughn said. “And the way things are going down there, tactical projections are that the Jem’Hadar will find the resistance inside of forty-eight hours anyway.”
Deanna took a deep breath and steeled herself. “Do you have confidence in the beam-in coordinates?”
“They were contained in the original resistance message the Nautilus received asking for Tevren. However, because the Jem’Hadar are expected to overrun that position at any time, we’ll go in with phasers drawn.” Vaughn stepped onto the platform and nodded to the transporter chief. “Be prepared to yank us out at a second’s notice.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Ready when you are, Commanders.”
Readying their own weapons, Deanna and Will joined him on the transporter pad, and Vaughn ordered, “Energize.”
The next instant Deanna glanced around, finding herself on a rocky ledge at night, a dark wilderness spread out below her.
Vaughn, phaser ready, did a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree visual sweep of their beam-in location. “If the resistance was here, looks like they’ve left.”
Deanna started to agree, then felt the gentle probe of a highly adept telepath brush her mind. A man stepped out of what appeared to be a solid wall of rock with his hands raised in a nonthreatening gesture.
“You’re Starfleet, aren’t you?” He made no effort