It had been two days until the Doctor had cleared the Ferengi prisoner as fit enough to be questioned. In that time very little else had come to light and more than ever Captain Taybar hoped that the Ferengi would be able to shed some light on the whereabouts of the mirror Leviathan.

The iso-linear chip that Chu had brought back from the wrecked Ferengi Marauder was foxing even Commander Rashad. The logs Chu had downloaded had so far shown no interesting information. Only with the Dilithium ore and the two explosive warheads had progress been made, both results terrifying the Captain.

The processed ore showed an increase of nearly twenty percent over the ore used throughout the Federation and the two explosive warheads had an explosive yield three times that of any similar sized device. Either of these gave the mirror vessel an edge over her own vessel and together posed a significant threat. Commander Taline had made several attempts to refine the ore into a workable form, but the process used up so much of the ore that refining it was proving uneconomic.

Aki looked at the viewscreen, which showed the interrogation room beyond the wall. On the screen was the image of the Ferengi prisoner sat behind a table, looking straight at her. He had been brought into the interrogation room a couple of minutes ago and two security guards stood either side of the door. Aki knew that a further two security officers were posted outside the door and that each end of the corridor was sealed off by forcefields, two more security guards posted at each junction.

Lieutenant Commander Barker and Major Phanan entered the room and sat opposite the prisoner. Then Chu spoke to the prisoner for the first time.

"Under Federation criminal law." Chu started. "Sub-Mon Floc, you have been charged with several offences, including aiding a known enemy of the Federation, failure to comply with a Federation security patrol, firing on Federation officers and dealing in restricted and illegal materials. I must inform you that you have the right to remain silent, but I must warn you that anything you do say will be recorded and used in your prosecution."

"I demand to be released." Floc shouted. "These charges are falsified and when Daimon Leggett returns, he will prove so. The Federation and Starfleet will not get away with this."

Chu and the Major were quite for a moment, waiting to see if Floc would continue with his protest. When he didn't, Chu rose from his seat and activated the viewscreen on the wall.

"Take a good look at these images." Chu stated. "Look at all this devastation, death, these are the kind of people you and your crew have been dealing with. People who would allow an entire vessel to be destroyed. We've counted over two hundred dead Ferengi, almost an entire Marauder crew I believe."

Images from the Hellcat's voyage to the Ferengi Marauder continued to appear on the screen, image after image of wrecked shuttles, life-pods and even individual bodies passed over the screen. Then the devastation of the Marauder itself, large holes open to space with more bodies floating around both inside and outside the ship.

"Help us help yourself." Major Phanan remarked. "These people laid a minefield in the asteroid belt and never told you about it. They just left, knowing full well that when you entered the asteroid field, your vessel would be destroyed. They don't care about you and you're letting them get away with mass murder."

"All these images are lies, computer generated to make me talk." Floc protested. "When Daimon Leggett returned, he'll prove these false."

"I assure you Floc that these images are real." Chu commented. "Taken before and after we rescued you from that vessel. We took the time to heal you from the effects of your own nerve toxin, just to show you false images."

"All images false." Floc replied. "All fake, Federation lies and propaganda."

"You owe us big-time." Phanan remarked, his voice raised. "First we take you off that wreck, then we fix you up. If it wasn't for us, you'd still be on that ship, starving to death. Don't you get it, no-ones coming back for you because everyone who knows where you were are dead, killed by the very people your silence is protecting."

Chu put his arm on the Major's shoulder. John reacted to the touch and stood up, anger still rushing through his body. The two officers left the room, leaving Floc seated alone. They walked next door and into the room where Captain Taybar had watched the whole series of events.

"He's not going to talk." Major Phanan remarked. "Either he's so sure that someone will come back and rescue him or he knows nothing. Either way we're not going to get anything out of him."

"I agree." Chu commented. "He's either very well trained not to talk or so stupid that he can't even see when we're showing him the truth."

"Time is of the essence." Aki remarked. "We'll leave him for an hour or so, let's give him something to eat and try again."

"I'll arrange a meal for him." Chu remarked, leaving the room. A couple of minute's later, Chu walked into the interrogation room and placed a tray of food on the table.

"How do I know this food isn't drugged or poisoned ?" Floc asked.

"You'll just have to trust me." Chu replied. "But why would we want to drug or kill you. You are already in our custody, facing heavy charges, if we wanted to kill you then we would have left you aboard your ship. And if we'd had wanted to use drugs to get you to talk, we could have done so earlier, when you were suffering from the toxin, you would probably have never known."

Floc looked at the food on the tray and started to eat it with his fingers as if he hadn't eaten in days. Chu left the room and after quickly checking in with the Captain and the Major, went to check something else out from the sensor logs of the Marauder.

It took him an hour to find what he had been looking for in the sensor logs. It was so small that unless you were looking for it specifically it would have appeared as background noise. A modulated signal picked up by the Marauders sensors transmitted by the mirror vessel just as it approached the asteroid belt. The same signal was transmitted again as the mirror Leviathan moved away from the asteroid belt and hidden minefield. The sensors had shown the movements of the mirror vessel as it moved through the system, but for some reason the Marauder's long-range sensors were off-line and no trace of the vessel was found once it left the system.

At last a breakthrough, Chu now realised that he had the deactivation codes for the minefield. Chu returned to talk to the Captain and informed him of the breakthrough.

"Time to take our visitor on a little trip." Captain Taybar announced. "Let's show him the savagery of these so-called allies of his first hand."

"Understood, I'll go prepare one of the shuttles." Chu remarked.

Chu left the room and headed to the shuttlebay, whilst the Major entered the interrogation room and after receiving confirmation that the shuttle was now ready, escorted Floc to the shuttlebay and onto the shuttle. An hour later, Floc was back in the interrogation room, 'singing like a canary'. The codes had indeed deactivated the minefield and Floc had seen first hand the death and destruction that had been caused to his ship and crew.

Two hours later, Floc had told Chu and John all that he knew. About the mission given to Daimon Leggett by Daimon Shia. About the meeting with the Captain of the ISS Leviathan, a young woman of incredible beauty and how she had traded the ore and equipment for supplies and equipment to repair her vessel. He also explained about the damage to his own ship caused by a run-in with the Klingons and how they had used the dry-dock facilities to make repairs, whilst the ISS Leviathan had left. Finally he spoke of the information on how to refine the Dilithium ore effectively which had been contained on an Iso-linear chip.

Within ten minutes Commander Rashad had deciphered the chip and was looking over all the information contained on it. As well as detailed instructions on how to refine the ore, there were detailed plans to create more of the warheads they had found aboard the Marauder plus several other systems that could be created using the ore. The most interesting was a method of creating a micro-wormhole, just large enough to fire a torpedo through. The system it would appear had never been perfected, but they had created wormholes covering over a hundred light-years long.

Chu finally left the briefing room and returned to talk to the Captain once more.

"I think he's told us everything he knows." Chu remarked. "And I think our little trip into the asteroid field will give him nightmares for years."

"I'll arrange for his transfer back to Earth to stand trial for his crimes." Aki stated. "Have Shale and Oakenshield prepare the 'Hudson' to take him back to Earth."

"Understood." Chu replied.

Six hours later, Floc was placed onto the runabout 'Hudson' for his second shuttle flight of the day, flanked by two security guards. He was placed into a makeshift brig, whilst the security officers sat watch. Two more security officers sat in the flight deck, alongside Ensign Oakenshield and Lieutenant Shale.

The 'Hudson' left the Leviathan behind, enroute to Earth, little knowing what lay ahead of them.