Read Online Star Trek: The Fall: The Poisoned Chalice by James Swallow - Free Book Online Page B

the nexus for one or more criminal enterprises of minor scale, but his purpose here was not to interfere with such minutiae.
    The fact remained that Tuvok was uncertain as to exactly what his purpose here was . Again he went over the orders in his mind, sifting the terse language for any deeper meaning. He recalled the words of his former commander Kathryn Janeway when confrontedwith similar directives in the past; “cloak and dagger,” she had called it, an apt—if somewhat theatrical—description that illustrated not only the inherent obfuscation, but also the potential for danger.
    As he mused on this, the Vulcan became aware of someone moving past the edge of his booth. A human male, dressed in the jumpsuit and gear vest of a dock worker, slid into the seat opposite him. Only the lower half of his face was visible, the rest hidden behind dark pilot’s eyeshades and a grimy gray ushanka hat. Tuvok’s immediate sense was that this was a disguise of some sort; it did not match the man who wore it. He had an ill-trimmed beard that split into a smile that Tuvok found immediately familiar. “Mind if I join you?”
    â€œI am waiting for a friend,” Tuvok said automatically, appending the code phrase he had been given. “From the barge.”
    â€œThe barge sank,” came the correct counter. “What a shame.” The man reached up to remove his hat and glasses, and what Tuvok had taken at first glance to be a mistaken observation on his part was revealed as quite the opposite.
    â€œSir?” he whispered.
    William Riker’s face looked back at him, a humorless twist to his lips. “Yeah,” said the newcomer with a shrug. “I get that a lot.”
    Tuvok’s eyes narrowed as the moment of surprise faded. It was almost impossible that this man could be Titan ’s commander, and equally there were myriad explanations for who or what else he might be. Anything from an android simulacrum to another hologram or a Changeling. . . . There were many possibilities, all of them troubling.
    â€œCome on, Tuvok, let’s cut to the chase,” said the other man. “You remember me, don’t you? Think back. We met on the Spartacus, you and me and your Maquis friends. That whole incident with the plague outbreak at the Helena colony? Of course, at the time I didn’t know you were with Starfleet Intelligence.”
    â€œYou are Thomas Riker,” said the Vulcan, with a sudden rush of insight.
    â€œMost people just call me Tom, for simplicity’s sake.”
    For all intents and purposes, Tuvok was looking at William Riker’s identical twin, but the circumstances that surrounded the two men did not stem from something as natural as sharing a mother’s womb.
    Tuvok had first encountered this man while under deep cover with a cell of Maquis renegades, later learning the full details of the incident that had led to Tom Riker’s “birth” through mission reports from the Enterprise -D, under Jean-Luc Picard.
    In 2369, the Enterprise had returned to the planet Nervala IV after a science team that included William Riker had been forced to evacuate eight years earlier; there, Picard’s crew encountered a duplicate of the Enterprise ’s first officer, created by a freak combination of atmospheric effects and a transporter malfunction. That duplicate—the very man who sat across from him now—had eventually taken Riker’s middle name and set out to live a life of his own. But he had become disenchanted with life in Starfleet and thus was prime material for recruitment into the Maquis resistance movement.
    â€œYou left after Helena,” Tuvok noted. “You abandoned the Federation for the Maquis.”
    â€œYes. But that didn’t work out so well for me in thelong run.” The other Riker’s approximation of events was somewhat understated; he had gone on to impersonate his so-called