The Good That Men Do - Andy Mangels [32]
Nog nodded, watching Jake cut the salami. “I don’t think Shran is the real focus of this mystery, though. I think it’s Commander Tucker. More of the foul-smelling meat, please?”
Jake looked at his friend and affected a perplexed expression. “Commander Tucker has exactly what to do with foul meat? Oh, you want more on your sandwich.” He gamely sliced off a few more pieces, then began assembling the sandwiches with a graceful economy of movement he’d picked up over the years he’d spent working in his grandfather Joseph’s restaurant in New Orleans. “Thanks for spoiling the surprise for me, Nog. You, of course, have seen all this already, so you know what’s coming.”
Nog shook his head. “Actually, I haven’t seen all of it yet. But I did watch and read through enough of it to get the basic gist before I decided to journey out here to see you.”
Jake cut the sandwiches in half, then slid the knife under them and transferred them to small plates. He handed one to Nog. “Here. Feed yourself, and don’t spoil any more surprises for me.”
“So, you don’t want to hear about the—”
Jake put a hand up over Nog’s mouth, and glared at him sternly. “No. I’ve already gotten my history through one filter, and now I’m seeing it through another. I don’t need to hear yet another version through the Nog-filter.”
He picked up his plate and his wineglass and padded toward the desk, a similarly encumbered Nog trailing after him.
“Boy, you can be as grumpy as your dad sometimes,” Nog said, almost under his breath.
“You don’t know the half of it,” Jake said, sitting down in his comfortable writing chair and setting his sandwich to the side. His hand trembled slightly as he moved to activate the padds again.
“Now hush up, and let’s see what comes next.”
Eight
Day Twenty-One, Month Of Tasmeen
Somewhere In Romulan Space
DOCTOR EHREHIN WAS AWAKENED in the semidarkness by a hard jolt of confusion. He was unsure for the moment exactly where he was as he rose slowly in his bed, his back protesting as he moved carefully to a sitting position.
“Cunaehr?” he called out, then listened attentively to the silence that answered.
At length he rose from the bed and cinched his robe tightly about his slight frame, tiny lightning bolts of pain assaulting his lower spine. Ignoring the familiar discomfort, he padded barefoot across the thick white carpet toward the heavy curtains that lined the richly appointed bedroom’s wide transparisteel window. He pulled on the sash, letting in the wan of light of the dawn that was just beginning to tease the horizon of this arid, relatively undeveloped planet.
Then, all in rush, he remembered where he was: safely ensconced inside one of the secret government villas on Nelvana III. It was the same place in which he had awakened with a quite similar jolt of confusion every morning since the drive-test mishap at the Unroth facility. He was beginning to believe that he would continue to arise each daybreak in temporary bewilderment, at least until such time as his project support people finally finished putting right the Unroth mess, so that the various tests and analyses could begin to go forward again.
Perhaps that time would arrive soon, since at the moment he truthfully could not recall just how many confusing mornings had passed since the Romulan military had brought him to Nelvana to recuperate in this isolated if luxurious estate.
“Cunaehr?” Ehrehin repeated, after turning away from the window to face the door at the broad bedroom’s opposite side. Still no one answered. Perhaps none of the staff had risen as yet. But that didn’t explain the lack of response of his bodyguards.
“Cunaehr?” Cunaehr, his beloved favorite student and assistant, would never have abandoned him