The Operative (A Star Trek novel)

Chapter Twenty-Eight

The cell is dank and cold, rough stone walls and a concrete floor. A single yellow incandescent bulb hanging on a cord from the high ceiling is the only light. The stones look like they were chiseled by crude tools many years ago. In places, the mortar has been squished out from between them to form little thin ledges of cement; in other places, the mortar is gone completely. In the corners are stagnant puddles of darkness harboring who knows what vermin.

Three cots are in the room, though "cot" is a rather kind term for them. All they really are is thin mattresses, the ticking coming out of rips in the filthy cloth covering, flung onto stone ledges. Stained sheets and scratchy-looking, dirty blankets are rumpled on them.

On one cot lies a wreck of a man, old, bent, and grizzled. He snores loudly, something he seems quite good at. At least, he has been doing it without respite since Kirk and Spock were unceremoniously thrown into the cell some hours ago, after spending the past two days—and nights—being interrogated in a perfunctory, if protracted, manner by half a dozen different inquisitors. It was as if the interrogation bureaucracy had been set in motion as a matter of course, but their hearts weren't really in it. Of the rest of the captives, they have seen nothing.

Kirk assumes that the real interrogation—or whatever—is still to come. He suspects their future holds a show trial for espionage (not that there wasn't a case to be made), a propaganda piece as much for the Federation as for Ocht's own citizens, then some end suitable to the crime and the barbarity of the planet.

The thought shocks him. Not the possibility of dying, but the fact that he actually accepts that this might be the end of him. He can remember being in plenty of situations surprisingly like this, but what he cannot remember is ever believing the outcome would be anything other than escape, carrying on his mission, saving the day.

At least McCoy got away. Maybe there was some hope for doing things the way Flynn's orders read, without an invasion by Starfleet troops.

Spock seems to be studying the man on the cot.

"Probably a plant," Kirk mutters.

"I think not, Captain," Spock says, raising an eyebrow at Kirk. "He seems human, if the worse for wear."

Kirk gives him an exasperated look, unsure if he is being put on or not. "A shill, Spock, an agent placed here to gather information."

"Ah."

"Did you hit your head when they threw us in here?"

Spock raises an eyebrow, looks slightly offended.

"Never mind, Spock, never mind." It has been a very long day.

He returns to examining the cell's door. It yields no startling new information, no revelations since last he examined it about five minutes ago. It is still large, still made of steel, still reinforced with diagonal beams, still locked.

"There appears to be no way out," he says.

"That would be," Spock says dryly, "the primary function of a jail cell."

Kirk shoots him a dirty look and leaves the door to stand over the other occupant of the cell.

"Wake up," he says, shaking his shoulder. "We need to talk to you."

"Go away!" the old man growls, knocking Kirk's hand away. "Can't a body get a decent nap around here? I know what you want to talk about anyway. I can save us all some trouble. There's no way out of here. If I coulda escaped, I'da done it ten years ago."

"You've been here ten years, in this rat-infested...?"

He is interrupted by a sound at the door. It creaks open, and both he and Spock instantly whirl and ready themselves for any opportunity that might be provided.