STAR TREK - TOS (5 page)

Impressed by Khan’s obvious brilliance and potential for good, Seven had even made a determined effort to recruit the teenage Khan into their own covert peacekeeping operation, but that bright idea had backfired spectacularly; in the end, Khan proved too ambitious to keep under control, and he had[31]

turned against her and Seven, stealing all their information on the Chrysalis Kids in the process. That was three years ago, and Khan had already rounded up several dozen of his supersmart and superstrong siblings, including Joaquin here, and enlisted them in his grandiose campaign to “save” the world by placing it under his complete and total control. Unfortunately, Roberta had the sneaking suspicion that Khan was just warming up. ...

“What’s up with the close shave?” she asked him glibly, stalling for time while she recovered from her shock-induced trip to dreamland. “The last time I saw you, back in eighty-nine, you were sporting a respectable-looking beard. I thought that was mandatory for all male Sikhs?”

Khan nodded, smiling appreciatively. “Very good, Ms. Lincoln. I applaud your cross-cultural erudition.”

He thoughtfully stroked his smooth and stubble-free chin. “With all due respect to my heroic Sikh ancestors, however, I eventually came to the conclusion that I should not be bound by the traditions of the past. I am a new breed of human being, after all. A new and superior kind of warrior. Thus, on my twenty-first birthday, I shaved off my beard, in recognition of the revolutionary turning point that I, and the others like me, represent in the history of human evolution. Henceforth, I resolved, I would make my own traditions, chart a new path for mankind.”

“I see you’re still as humble as ever,” Roberta observed dryly. As discreetly as possible, she searched her pockets for her servo, but the versatile device eluded her fingers. Had she dropped it back on the gantry, or had Khan and his people confiscated it? “Frankly, I[32]always kind of hoped that your delusions of grandeur were just a phase you were going through, something you’d outgrow eventually.”

She stopped fishing for the servo and started looking for an escape route; from what she could see, the office had only a single exit. “I guess that was wishful thinking.”

Khan scowled, his bogus bonhomie slipping. “Hardly delusions, Ms. Lincoln,” he said curtly. “Or have you forgotten how easily I have eluded you and the enigmatic Mr. Seven these past few years, despite the considerable resources at your command?”

True enough,Roberta conceded. Using data stolen from Seven’s advanced Beta 5 computer, Khan had even found a way to protect his strongholds against transporter technology, forcing her and Seven to use far more primitive techniques in their periodic attempts to infiltrate Khan’s hideouts and headquarters.

Just to reach Muroroa, in fact, Roberta had needed to teleport to another island, several miles south of this one, then brave the treacherous currents and coral reefs in an outrigger canoe until she came close enough to the forbidden atoll to jump overboard and scuba-dive the rest of the way, dodging sharks, moray eels, and poisonous jellyfish as she swam to shore not far from the rocket launch pad. A damp wet suit, along with a set of oxygen tanks, were presumably still hidden amidst the sword-shaped leaves of the bushes at the edge of the shore. Sadly, the scuba gear was too far away to do her much good at the moment.
Some South Seas vacation this is turning out to be,
she thought sarcastically.

“Maybe we’ve been keeping our eyes on you all along,” she challenged Khan, then wondered if she[33]

had said too much. What if Khan demanded to know the name of her chief informant? “Imagine our disappointment when we found out what you were up to here. Even Seven never thought you’d go this far. ...”

Khan’s face hardened. “Seven has always lacked vision,” he said scornfully. “That is why he is content to skulk in the margins of history, when he possesses the means to do so much more. And why I broke with him years ago. The problems of the world require bold, decisive action, not timid, cautious half-measures of the sort you and Seven specialize in.”

Roberta didn’t back down. “We put out fires. You start them. That’s a big difference, as far as I am concerned.”

“Fire can be a transforming force, Ms. Lincoln,” he stated, “clearing away the rotting debris of the past and making room for new growth.” He lifted the carved wooden shark from his desk, crushed it to splinters within his fist, then wiped the dusty residue from his palms. “But enough philosophical debate.

Your presence raises crucial questions: Where exactly is Gary Seven at this moment? Can we anticipate his arrival as well, in an attempt to rescue you, or perhaps complete your mission?”

I
wish,
Roberta thought. In fact, Seven was currently attending a key environmental summit in Rio, while recovering from injuries sustained during the fall of Kabul a few months back. Despite his own superhuman physique, the result of years of selective breeding on a planet light-years away, Seven was in no shape to stage a commando raid on the secluded and well-protected island.

“For someone with a superior brain,” she told[34]Khan, “your math needs work. Seven is in his sixties now; he lets me handle all the house calls.”

This was a slight exaggeration, but close enough to the truth that she hoped Khan would buy it. Over the years, she had indeed taken over more and more of the field work, leaving Seven to concentrate on the big picture.
One of these days, we really do need to bring in a new junior operative,
she mused.

Heaven knows I could use some backup right now.

“So Seven is finally feeling his years, is he?” Khan’s voice assumed a magnanimous tone, leading Roberta to suspect that he had taken her protestations at face value. “In a way, this saddens me. In his own fashion, he was a worthy adversary.”

A buzzer sounded behind Khan and he strode across the spacious office to answer the intercom on the desk. “Khan here,” he declared crisply. “What is our status?”

“We’re about ten minutes from launching, sir,”a disembodied voice spoke from the intercom. Roberta thought she detected a trace of a Scottish accent, along with the distinctly deferential tone. Her heart sank at the implications of the announcement. She hadn’t prevented the launch at all; the Ariane was still ready to deliver its obscene payload into orbit.
I’ve failed,
she realized.

“Excellent,” Khan pronounced, switching off the intercom without waiting for a reply. “I’m happy to say, Ms. Lincoln, that your feeble attempt at sabotage cost us merely half an hour, not nearly enough time to cause us to miss our launch window.” Stepping away from the desk, he stared down at her like an adult scolding a wayward child. “You should have[35]remembered that you were dealing with an intelligence deliberately engineered to exceed your own; anticipating sabotage, I had the foresight to install a failsafe advice into the Ariane’s guidance systems against any such interference.” He smiled condescendingly, pleased by his own remarkable foresight. “My apologies if my countermeasures came as something of, well, a shock to your system.”

Very funny,Roberta thought acidly. “Well, as surprises go, it wasn’t exactly up there with
The Crying
Game
.”She’d be damned if she was going to feed Khan’s already gargantuan ego. “But, yeah, I suppose it caught me a little off guard.”

Too bad my informant failed to mention Khan’s sneaky little safety precaution,she lamented.
Guess that
was one secret Khan was keeping under even tighter wraps than usual
. ...

“Your spirit is admirable,” he acknowledged, annoyingly unshaken by Roberta’s faint praise, “even if your accomplishments are not.” He marched toward the office’s only exit. “Bring her,” he instructed Joaquin, who grabbed her roughly by the arm and yanked her to her feet. His bruising grip reminded her of Carlos, the hulking guardian of the old Chrysalis Project—and one of the project’s earliest genetic experiments. She wondered if Joaquin’s muscles had been souped-up with gorilla DNA, too.

Following Khan, Joaquin dragged her out the door. A short flight of steps later, they arrived on the roof of the Mission Control building. The sun was newly risen, Roberta noted, providing her with a panoramic view of the picturesque island and its enclosed lagoon. Rising high above the swaying palm trees, on[36]

the opposite side of the tranquil blue waters, the Ariane and its attached launch tower looked incongruous amidst the idyllic South Seas scenery. Observing her gaze, Khan threw out his arms expansively. His pristine white suit reflected the bright morning sunshine. “Welcome, Ms. Lincoln, to Chrysalis Island!”

Roberta refused to concede even the loveliness of the setting. “I thought the whole place belonged to the French,” she retorted.

As a matter of fact, as she well knew, the French government had established the Centre d’Experimentation du Pacifique (CEP) on Muroroa back in 1963, as a testing site for atomic weapons, many of which had been exploded underground in artificial caverns carved out of the island’s basalt core.

Less than three months ago, however, France had suspended its nuclear testing program indefinitely, much to the relief of most of the world. Little did that world know, Roberta mused, that Muroroa was now playing host to something just as nasty—and possibly even more dangerous—than underground nuclear explosions.

And she didn’t just mean Khan.

“Our Gallic friends were under enormous international pressure to close this facility,” he explained.

Roberta recalled seeing news footage of anti-nuke protests on Fiji and the other islands. “Thus, I managed to ‘persuade’ certain French authorities to let me take it off their hands—discreetly, of course.”

Roberta could just imagine what kind of “persuasion” Khan had employed. Extortion? Blackmail?

Assassination?
It wouldn’t be the first time,
she thought; although she and Seven never uncovered definitive proof of Khan’s involvement, they had their[37]suspicions regarding a number of recent tragic events, such as the explosive death of that big-name Indian politician last spring.

“Indeed,” Khan continued, “this entire complex is perfectly suited to my needs, being equipped with its own electrical generators, desalination plant, airfield, communications center, and so forth, while its location near the equator makes it an ideal site for launching satellites into orbit.” He looked out over the sprawling compound, which was guarded on all sides by a high, fully electrified fence. “We have, of course, made key renovations, improving on what the French left behind.”

“I can’t wait for the guided tour,” Roberta said, not entirely sarcastic. With any luck, she would get a chance to scope out Khan’s new real estate, before or after she attempted to escape.

A small cluster of people had gathered atop the roof to witness the launch of the rocket. Loudspeakers mounted at the rear of the roof provided a countdown toward the rapidly approaching lift-off: “Launch minus two minutes.” Khan toyed with his wristwatch, synchronizing it with the countdown, before strolling across the whitewashed rooftop to join the others. He gestured for Joaquin to bring Roberta along.

“Okay, okay, I’m coming!” she muttered irritably as the thuggish henchman hustled her across the rooftop. Looking away from the distant gantry, Khan’s associates eyed her with varying degrees of curiosity, seemingly none too concerned by her status as an unwilling captive.

“Launch minus one minute, thirty seconds.”

[38]Khan ignored Roberta’s protests as well. “Permit me to introduce a few of the brilliant minds that I have assembled, at great effort and expense, on this island, This is Dr. Liam MacPherson,” he began, indicating a lanky, red-haired man in a white lab jacket, “a superlative astrophysicist and the head of launch operations. Doctor, meet Ms. Roberta Lincoln, an uninvited guest at today’s event.”

MacPherson gave Roberta a cursory examination before turning his attention back to the prepped and pregnant rocket on the launch pad. A compact headset kept him in touch with Mission Control and he stroked his beard, a tuft of coppery bristles, absent
-
mindedly as he whispered instructions into his mike.

Roberta didn’t take the snub personally, figuring that MacPherson was naturally preoccupied with the Ariane’s imminent departure. “Pleased to meet you, sort of,” Roberta murmured, even though the carrot-topped astrophysicist was clearly not listening. “Let’s, do this again sometime.”

“And this,” Khan continued, moving onto an exotically beautiful woman strikingly clad in a silk indigo sarong and matching top, “is the most exquisite Ament, one of my wisest and most trusted advisors.”

Gleaming black pearls, native to the Tuamoto Islands, shimmered upon her earlobes, the nacreous beads as dark and lustrous as her shoulder-length black hair. Cool, amber eyes looked Roberta over silently, conveying an air of haughty amusement. Her lithe, languid body seemed both youthful and timeless.

Roberta disliked her on principle. “Nice pearls,” she stated flatly, figuring that if you can’t say[39]

something nice about a person, you can always compliment their jewelry.

“Thank you,” Ament said coolly Her low, husky voice had a faintly Arabic accent. “They were a gift from Khan.”

He nodded, his hands clasped behind his back. “I wrested them myself from the giant black-lipped oysters found only in these islands. Did you know, Ms. Lincoln,” he expounded, “that a Polynesian pearl diver can descend up to forty meters in search of treasure? A remarkable feat, for an ordinary human, although, of course, easily within my own abilities.”

“Everybody needs a hobby,” Roberta said dryly
A little more pearl diving, a little less geopolitical
power mongering,
she reflected,
and the whole world would be a happier place.

“More like an invigorating diversion,” Khan stated by way of clarification. He walked to the edge of the rooftop, the better to observe the rocket on its launch pad. “Not that today requires any stimulation beyond what we are about to witness.”

“Launch minus sixty seconds,” the loudspeaker announced, calling an end to the introductions. A hush of anticipation fell over the small grouping on the roof. On the launch pad across the turquoise lagoon, the massive metal structure of the gantry retreated from the Ariane, leaving the slender rocket alone upon the launch, pointed up at the sky like a gigantic blue-and-white hypodermic.
An appropriate image,
Roberta thought, given the high-tech poison carried in its payload.