‘Clear.’ Aryn felt his voice ring out in the darkened corridor, and only discipline and necessity meant he didn’t throw up.

Behind him, Q’ira stepped over the body of the first guard and peered at the second at the door. ‘You should have given me a proper gun,’ she said, waggling her little hold-out disruptor.

‘XO was right. That would be illegal. We’re already bending the rules on you being here. Official report’s going to have to say that Blackbird’s software intrusion brought down the power.’ He glanced at her. ‘You’re a civilian, after all.’

‘That’s still crazy to me. I helped you on Ilior. On Kalviris.’

‘First: don’t talk specifics out loud on an op. Second: that was either in the scope of a cleared mission, or undeniable necessity. We were stranded. This is different. Even if we’re a body down.’ He picked his way towards the door, eyeing the dead panel beside it that would, if there were power, get him to the locking display.

‘The rules you people choose to care about,’ Q’ira sighed as she followed him. ‘These guys are scum.’

‘That’s why we bend the rules.’ He looked the panel over. ‘I would have thought emergency power might kick in.’

‘Three gave me the gear I needed. Sabotage looks like a glitch that’s just about to right itself, basically. Every time emergency power is about to gear up, it sends a signal telling the system that it’s okay.’ She moved to the panel and reached to pull the frame off. ‘Now this… there should be the manual override in here.’

‘You did well,’ Aryn said, watching her work, because he didn’t want to be in the dark and silent, knowing what was on the other side of the door. ‘Two would have done this, normally. You were professional.’

‘I wasn’t. I was practiced. Because I didn’t get your fancy training, but I did learn how to do this where the consequences for failure were being shot, not being made to do laps.’ Q’ira reached in and found what she was looking for after a minute. ‘Gotcha.’ And the door opened.

It was wrong to say Aryn couldn’t imagine being down here, in this room where people were clustered like chattel, with tags around their necks to keep them identified so their owners knew what bits would need carving out of them. He’d not only imagined it; he’d dreamt it, and done so for years, after almost every time a new report had come in about a place like this. He’d come narrowly close to ending up somewhere like this himself.

He could only imagine what it must have been like for the imprisoned xBs when the lights went out. Waiting in the dark could not have been an occasion for hope. More likely, the assumption must have been, that the operation had decided it was time to cut their losses. Perhaps that would come with death now, something pumped in to kill them in confined spaces in the dark. Perhaps they would simply be locked and left there.

Aryn propped up his night-vision goggles onto his forehead and turned on his flashlight, largely so everyone could see, and partly so they could see he had a face. Bodies shifted in the gloom, moans of fear emanating from the depths.

‘You’re alright,’ he called, mouth tasting like ash. ‘We’re Starfleet. We’re here to get you out of here.’

In his office, Kanem had found a flashlight and a gun, but only the wits to use the former when Cassidy and Rosewood breached the door.

Goggles on his forehead, Cassidy looked him over and scoffed. ‘Y’know, they say you should have a better work-life balance than this.’

Rosewood was supposed to be the one to make jokes, he thought. But his heart was pounding too heavily in his chest, and he stood behind Cassidy, jaw clenched tight, weapon in an iron grasp.

Kanem looked down at the disruptor in his hand, then up at the two armed and armoured operators. ‘You’ve no idea who you’re fucking with, Starfleet.’

‘Like you said. We’re Starfleet.’ Cassidy advanced, seeming to not care about the gun, and grabbed Kanem from behind the desk to throw him to the floor of the office. He kicked the disruptor away. ‘Do we look like we care about a two-bit crook like you? Five, get to work.’

Kanem raised his hands, hissing an oath. ‘You destroy me, then someone else takes my place – someone less predictable, less manageable -’

‘See, that’s true for so much of you scum. Better the devil you know, and all that. But what’s a worse devil than you? Three xB harvesting operations that fill the gap, all with less resources, less connections? Less name recognition that makes bounty hunters take on these unsavoury contracts?’ Cassidy shook his head as he loomed over the man. ‘You’re not the devil I know. You’re vermin. And even if vermin comes back, you destroy the nest.’ His eyes flickered up to Rosewood, who hadn’t moved. ‘Five.’

‘Right.’ Rosewood’s eyes snapped up, and he advanced to the console on the desk. He slung his pack to pull out a mobile power source and connected it to the dead terminal. A few quick key-presses and the system hummed back to life, just enough for him to interface with it.

‘I’m in,’ said Falaris. The power supply came with a linkup to the Blackbird. ‘Extracting the data now.’

‘I’ve got friends,’ Kanem was hissing. ‘People reliant on my operation. People you don’t want to make enemies of.’

‘Can’t imagine what it’s like to make enemies of crime bosses,’ Cassidy drawled.

‘You think it’s just Neutral Zone scum I work with? You think the Free State doesn’t need me?’

Cassidy cocked his head. ‘Now ain’t that interesting. Do tell.’

Kanem’s eyes widened. ‘I… yes. I know things. Free State local operations. The things they do to keep the Neutral Zone in the condition they like it.’

‘Start with Aestri.’ Cassidy waggled his phaser in Kanem’s face. ‘We’re learning what you did for her right now. But where’s she gone?’

He worked his jaw, then swallowed. ‘I tell you,’ he croaked, ‘and you leave?’

‘Sure.’

‘I mean, leave now. No more damage to my operation. You don’t hurt me.’

‘I won’t hurt you. I promise nothing else.’

Kanem swallowed hard. ‘Virida Station. Abandoned old Star Empire research facility. Edge of the Lliew Rift.’

‘That’s true,’ said Falaris in Rosewood and Cassidy’s ears. ‘I’m just skimming now, but the Lliew Rift is mentioned in this work order – something about space-time ruptures?’

The two Rooks exchanged glances, and Cassidy scoffed, glancing back at Kanem. ‘Turns out, that’s something we could have found out for ourselves.’

‘I… the Free State, then!’ Kanem babbled. ‘I can tell you about Tal Shiar operatives, operations, deals…’

The disruptor pistol sat on the floor by the desk where Cassidy had kicked it. Rosewood was almost stood over it as he’d linked Falaris in, but now she was working and he wasn’t needed.

It was light in his hand. Intricate carvings down the grip gave it a personalised touch, but it packed a tidy punch; he could tell from the modified power cells. Kanem carried it to impress, but he was also ready to use it. It sat well in Rosewood’s grip. Comfortable, even through his gloves. The trigger had a good resistance, but pulled clean and smooth.

Just like the shot, clean and smooth through Kanem’s head.

‘Woah!’ Cassidy jumped, eyes wide. ‘What the hell!’

Rosewood stared down at the Romulan’s body. Then he tossed the disruptor pistol down beside Kanem, and said, in a tone he knew came across as almost comedically emphasised, ‘Didn’t realise he could reach his gun. Guess he saw that was the only way out.’

Cassidy stared into space for a moment. Then he reached up to turn off his mic, and nodded for Rosewood to do the same. For a moment, both men stood there, silent in the dark. When Cassidy did speak, his voice was a low rumble. ‘He was offering us intel. A deal. Thought you loved those.’

Rosewood’s gaze dragged from the body to his team leader. ‘You were right before,’ he said, bile in his throat. ‘This is no place – no thing – to make a deal with.’

‘Fuck me,’ Cassidy sighed, looking away. ‘You better get a grip, Five, and get it quick -’

‘Like you did?’ Rosewood snarled. ‘Giving all that money to Nank, then threatening Pendeor and Gravik, then deciding we do brute force here -’

‘Command said we buy from Nank,’ Cassidy snapped. ‘That was the mission. That was a determination made based on analysis of what Nank does, where he spends his money, who it goes to, and what the harm might be, a decision made by people above our heads. They decided we compromise, and that it was worth the risk. After that point, I have been making every decision based on doing as little harm, as little impact as possible.’

‘You threatened Gravik because you were angry, and decided we burn this place because it’s an evil right in front of your face instead of one a hundred light-years away.’ Rosewood jabbed a furious finger at the workshop floor through the windows. ‘Don’t dare act like you’re making calm calculations -’

‘Why not? ‘Cos you think I’m angry? I am. I’m fucking furious. But I know what to do with that fury, and I know there’s a difference between letting it out when it’s useful, and what you’ve been doing.’ Cassidy’s lip curled. ‘You think that pretending to be reasonable means you’ve not been so coiled up with rage that it’s blinding you?’

‘I didn’t -’

‘Pretending to be reasonable meant you nearly handed a fortune to Gravik and a fortune to that scumbag.’ Cassidy pointed at the body. ‘Because you think getting through a problem without violence is the same as getting through a problem without harm. While you’ve been willing to dance with the devil, ‘cos your instincts tell you not to do that, and you don’t trust yourself.’ His eyes fell now on what remained of Kanem. ‘Until now.’

Rosewood stared down at his handiwork. Bile again rose in his throat, and he fought to swallow it, but before he had to reply, there was a chirrup from his earpiece.

‘Uh. One? Five? You still there? I’m, uh, done,’ came Falaris’s report.

Cassidy stared Rosewood down for a moment, then flicked his mic on. ‘Understood, Blackbird. We’ll wrap up here.’ He jerked his head at the console. ‘Pack up.’

The disruptor had felt comfortable in Rosewood’s grip, but now his fingertips tingled as he worked. Packing away the equipment to breach the console felt methodical but clunky, and by the time he was following Cassidy out into the workshop floor, blood was pounding in his ears.

Nallera was there, voice sounding like it came from a long way away. ‘…charges set,’ came her muffled report. ‘…timer, or we can remote detonate…’

To Rosewood’s eyes, Cassidy moved as if dragging himself through tar as he gestured and instructed. One of the guards was roused, stripped of weapons, and given the explanation that they had five minutes to drag their comrades free or they could join the facility when it imploded.

Beyond them, Aryn and Q’ira were leading gaunt, pale figures out from a stairwell and through to the outside. Some of the xBs walked stiffly but steadily as they boarded the cargo shuttle, those healthy ones responsible for powering the vehicle up, getting ready to leave. Others helped those who were less able; the ones whose liberation from the Collective had been hard, or those whose limbs and organs had already been taken.

Rosewood hadn’t realised he was staring at the procession until Q’ira slunk up beside him. She looked like she might have been crying at some point, shoulders hunched. She nudged him with an elbow.

‘It was worse down there,’ was all she said, and they stood in a companionable, hollow silence. Aryn, grim-faced, did not stop working until the xBs were all loaded, and the cargo shuttle was ready to go.

‘You’re the only life-signs left in the facility,’ Falaris’s voice confirmed. ‘Guards have dragged each other free.’

‘They don’t deserve that,’ Q’ira muttered.

‘We don’t get to decide,’ said Nallera, sounding discontent. ‘Apparently, only people hundreds of light-years away who never see this place get to make those decisions.’

‘They’re not our mission,’ Cassidy said, cutting them off. ‘Assemble for beam-out. We’ll detonate once back aboard and the freighter’s clear.’

Aryn looked around as he rejoined them. ‘Where’s Kanem?’

Rosewood swallowed, but Cassidy answered without missing a beat. ‘Shot himself,’ the big man said. ‘We got the package anyway.’

Nallera made a small noise. ‘We shouldn’t look so glum, then,’ she said, glancing around the empty factory they’d gutted and cleared out, that would soon be dust, its sins buried and its mechanisms of evil destroyed. ‘After all: we won. Mission accomplished.’

When the light claimed them, it did not feel earned.