Christopher L. Bennett - Star Trek: Typhon Pact: The Struggle Within

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S TAR T REK
TYPHON PACT

THE STRUGGLE WITHIN

OTHER STAR TREK NOVELS BY
CHRISTOPHER L. BENNETT

Star Trek: Ex Machina

Star Trek Titan: Orions Hounds

Star Trek: The Next GenerationThe Buried Age

Places of Exile (from Star Trek: Myriad UniversesInfinitys Prism)

Star Trek: The Next GenerationGreater than the Sum

Star Trek Titan: Over a Torrent Sea

Star Trek: Department of Temporal Investigations

Watching the Clock

SHORT FICTION

Aftermath (from Star Trek Corps of Engineers: Aftermath)

... Loved I Not Honor More (from Star Trek: Deep Space

NineProphecy and Change)

Brief Candle (from Star Trek: VoyagerDistant Shore)

As Others See Us (from Star Trek: Constellations)

The Darkness Drops Again (from Star Trek: Mere Anarchy)

Friends with the Sparrows (from Star Trek: The Next

GenerationThe Skys the Limit)

Empathy (from Star Trek: Mirror Universe

Shards and Shadows)

MORE NOVELS

X-Men: Watchers on the Walls

Spider-Man: Drowned in Thunder

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

TM , and 2011 by CBS Studios Inc. STAR TREK and related marks are trademarks of CBS Studios Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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First Gallery Books ebook edition October 2011

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eISBN 978-1-4516-5142-3

Conscience is the root of all true courage;
if a man would be brave let him obey his conscience.

James Freeman Clarke

U.S.S. ENTERPRISE

STARDATE 59881.2

J ean-Luc Picard stood before the empty platform in the main transporter room, trying not to fidget as he awaited the arrival of the Enterprise-Es distinguished guests. Next to him, Commander Worf gave the captain a sidelong look. You seem anxious, sir.

Excited, Mister Worf, he corrected. Ive been looking forward to this.

The Klingon nodded sagely. Yes. With this treaty, the last piece of the expanded Khitomer Alliance will fall into place. It is an honor to be a part of it.

Yes, certainly that, Picard said. Assuming, of course, that we can persuade them to sign. But my enthusiasm is more personal. I havent seen the lad in nearly sixteen years. Hardly a lad anymore, I suppose. Hes made quite a name for himself in diplomatic circles. But I suppose I cant help feeling a certain... almost paternal pride in his accomplishments.

Worf gave a rumble that those who knew him well would recognize as amusement. As I recall, that was a role you were reluctant to accept at the time.

Oh, I fought it tooth and nail. But it was my first taste of a parental role, and in a way it helped prepare me for the real thing. I must admit, Im a little nervous...

Uh, Captain? said the transporter operator. Alrescha Control reports theyre ready to beam aboard.

Picard faced the platform again and straightened his tunic. Energize.

Moments later, two figures materialized, and the older, larger man stepped down to face him. Captain Picard! Ambassador Endar of the Talarian Republic bowed in a ritual greeting, his gloved hands clasped before him. An honor to meet you once again.

Picard returned the bow and said, The honor is mine, Ambassador.

And an auspicious meeting it is, Endar replied in a deep, measured voice. When last we met, your actions turned our peoples from the brink of war and laid the seeds for our current good relations. Now, with luck, together we can take those relations to the next level.

You are too kind, Picard said. All I did was correct my own mistake which had brought us to that brink to begin with.

But it takes a brave man to admit his mistakes, said the younger man who stood at Endars side, a lanky, square-jawed fellow with blond hair and no sign of the knobby cranial ridges crowning Endars skull. My father and I both honor that bravery.

Jono. Youve grown into a fine young man. Picard clasped the ungloved hands Jono extended, appreciating what it meant. He had first met Jono as a fourteen-year-old human rescued from a wrecked Talarian observation craft. Starfleet records had identified him as Jeremiah Rossa, believed killed during the Talarian attack on Galen IV when he was less than four years of age. But the boy had seen himself as Talarian, refusing to shed his gloves and touch an alien, and had regarded Endar, then a warship captain, as his father. Doctor Crusher had found evidence of multiple injuries and feared the boy had been abducted and abused, and his grandmother, Admiral Connaught Rossa, had insisted that he be repatriated. But in time, Picard and Crusher had learned the truth: Endar had rescued the orphaned boy and adopted him according to Talarian tradition, lovingly raising him as a son. The injuries had simply been the wear and tear voluntarily endured by a competitive, somewhat reckless child in a rough-and-tumble society. And most of all, Jono had thought of himself as Talarian for as long as he could remember, and was willing to die rather than reject that heritage. Picard had belatedly realized that he had no right to deny Jono his Talarian identity simply because his genes were human, and that the Federations own condescension toward a society less peaceful than theirs had led him and Crusher to misjudge the situation. When Picard had returned the boy to his adoptive father, Jono had finally removed his gloves and taken Picards head in his hands, touching foreheads as he would with his own father. Even though he was returning to his life as a Talarian, Jono had acknowledged that Picard was no longer an alien to him.

And Im pleased to see, Picard went on, that youve chosen a career in diplomacy like your father.

In fact, Endar told him, it was I who became a diplomat because of Jono. He desired to learn more of his human heritage while still serving Talar. I took the role of ambassador to the Federation so that he could be my apprentice and ultimately my successor.