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As it happened, she only had to wait for five years. A major war was fought in the interim, though the fighting never actually reached Narendra despite its position near both the Romulan and Federation borders.

Aidulac continued to wait.

Then, finally, the Instrument was exposed.

Naturally, it was on the other side of the planet.

From here on, Aidulac had to be careful. She could not afford to use the Sun, as it would be detected. Besides, Malkus’s consciousness had, as she had feared, been imprisoned within the Instrument. Now he planned to rebuild his empire.

The fools. The unmitigated fools. The thought was directed at the well-meaning rebels who had overthrown Malkus. They should have just killed him and had done with it. But no, they had to teach him a lesson, to imprison him, to make him suffer.

They don’t understand him. No one ever did. Not even me.

Especially not me. If I had, I would have just killed myself when he came to me.

First she took a boat to the mainland. Then she needed to find a groundcar to take her to where the memorial was being built. That had proven difficult, but not impossible. Her own immunity and invisibility to Malkus’s telepathic control enabled her to move freely, but avoiding visual detection was a lot harder. Her own talents for persuasion were helpful, but not always reliable.

Now, though, she was less than an hour away on foot from the memorial site where he’d been uncovered.

Then, she thought, this will all finally be over.

Vralk maneuvered the Gorkon into position, hoping to draw fire away from the Enterprise so they could use their device to neutralize Malkus.

It doesn’t surprise me, Vralk thought with disdain. Klag would leave the glory to the weaklings of the Federation, even though it was we who learned the secret for defeating this Malkus thing. He turned to glance at the secondary gunner positions, specifically the one where the Bajoran woman sat. He even lets inferiors serve on his bridge. He is so unworthy of this vessel, it makes me ill.

“Bring us around,” Tereth shouted, “187 mark 9. Now, Lieutenant!”

Vralk changed course to 187 mark 9 and restrained himself from telling Commander Tereth to stop blathering at him. As Rodek had said, she was the first officer, even if she didn’t deserve it—after all, as Lokor had said, he would find no allies for his cause on this ship.

“Hard to port,” Tereth said. “Try to get the Rikmok off the Enterprise’ s saucer.”

“Shields failing,” Toq said. “The birds-of-prey are continuing to fire!”

“Covering fire,” Klag said. “Drive them off with the rear weapons, but try not to destroy them.”

Vralk could not help himself. “We show weakness before the enemy?”

Klag turned angrily on Vralk. “They are not our enemy. When a Klingon truly takes up arms against me, then I will kill him or die without hesitation, but I will not destroy mind-controlled slaves unless I have to. And I do not have to—yet.”

Disruptor blasts and torpedoes continued to slam into the Gorkon’ s shields. Vralk found he could not avoid all of them, especially now that they were close to the Enterprise—some of the Defense Force ships simply fired on both targets. While the Enterprise and Gorkon were far more powerful, they were also larger and less maneuverable than their eight foes.

“The QaS DevwI’ have all reported in,” the ensign at communications said. “All ground troops are standing by.”

“Good,” Tereth said.

Again, Vralk found he could not help himself. He turned to Tereth, who was standing between the com console and Vralk’s own helm control. “The QaS DevwI’ will not be able to lead the troops into battle if we are blown up before they can be deployed!”

Another impact. Several consoles went down.

“Shields have failed!” Toq cried.

“You are a fool to continue this!” Vralk said, getting up and walking toward Tereth. “We must—”

Tereth suddenly leapt at Vralk, tackling him.

As Vralk fell to the deck his heart sang out with joy. At last, the fool woman has tipped her hand! She feels the need to silence me