The Sky's the Limit - Marco Palmieri [151]
I regarded him with derision. “You expect me to believe that?”
“I am a gul in Central Command, Captain. I have the rank and position to know a great deal about the inner workings of our war effort, and I know what is happening at Raknal V.”
“And you will just give me this information?”
He nodded. “In exchange for getting to see Glinn Driana. After I have spoken to her, I will gladly tell you everything I know about Raknal V.”
“Tell me first, then I will allow you to—”
“No!” The vehemence with which he said that one syllable almost struck me like a slap. The two security guards on duty, Horowitz and Simone, both moved their hands to their sidearms.
Seeing that, Madred made a show of calming himself. “I will see Glinn Driana, or you receive no information from me.”
With that, he turned and sat back on the bunk, staring straight ahead.
“You have my terms, Captain” was all he would say.
I left the brig.
“Be quiet!” he screams as he again turns on the four lights that he claims are five.
“In spite of all you’ve done to me, I find you a pitiable man.”
“Picard, stop it,” he says, raising the control for the neural implant, “or I will turn this on and leave you in agony all night.”
I bark out a laugh and point at him. “You called me ‘Picard’!”
“What are the Federation’s defense plans for Minos Korva?”
I give him only one answer: “There are four lights!”
He activates the implant. Pain racks my body as he insists there are five lights. I try to resist, taking refuge in an old song from my childhood…
Ironically, it was time for the appointment I’d made with Deanna. I had forgotten that I’d even made it until I was outside her office, simply wishing to speak with her.
Once again, I entered to find her reading over a padd. “Captain,” she said at my entrance. “I’m glad you could make it.”
I took my seat opposite her, tugging my uniform jacket.
“How has the interrogation been going?”
I filled her in on what Madred had said—which was very little—and then told her about the trade he proposed.
Deanna put a finger to her chin. “Do you believe that his intelligence will be useful?”
“It’s impossible to be sure. He’s correct that he is of sufficient rank to possibly be aware of what is happening on Raknal. But he might also be lying in order to see his subordinate.” I gave a half smile. “Lying is Madred’s modus operandi, after all.”
Leaning back in her chair, Deanna said, “What I find curious is Madred’s interest in the glinn. Why does he wish to see her particularly?”
That brought me up short. I honestly hadn’t given that a moment’s thought. “You know—I have no idea.”
“It might be worth discovering that.”
I shook my head. “But it almost doesn’t matter—I can’t fulfill my end of the bargain either way. Glinn Driana is dead. And therein lies my dilemma.”
“Which is?”
Again, I tugged on my uniform jacket. “The only way I will be able to obtain Gul Madred’s intelligence is to lie to him. I must…I must do to him what he did to me.”
“Captain,” Deanna said, leaning forward and putting a reassuring hand on mine, “there is no danger of your doing to him what he did to you.”
“He manipulated me, Counselor—he lied, he caused me pain, and in the end he broke me. If I lie to him, if I tell him that Driana is alive and well and gain intelligence from him, and then renege on my part of that bargain—how does that make me different from him?”
She removed her hand. “Captain, there is a war on, and—”
“I don’t accept that rationalization.”
Tartly, Deanna said, “It’s not a rationalization, Captain.”
“Isn’t it? When we use war as an excuse for extreme behavior, where does it end? Madred tortured me, ostensibly to obtain information about Minos Korva. His nation was at war with mine, or at least they intended to be, so does that justify his actions, done as they were for the greater good of the Cardassian Union?”
“Of course not,” Deanna said.
I gestured in a manner that was almost pleading. “Then how do I justify manipulating Madred now?”
Deanna stared at me for a moment, her face unusually opaque. “At Ricktor Prime,