by Peter David
slipping off his shoulder. But then Tang was there,
steadying him, although actually he seemed a bit more
concerned about the weapon's safety than Riker's.
"Here, you take it," said Riker, handing it off
to Tang. Although Tang was a head shorter than
Riker, he hefted the weapon as if it weighed a
fraction of what it actually did. Riker tried
to suppress his astonishment at the display of
strength and was only partially successful. "What
is that?"
"This," said Tang, patting it proudly with his
free hand, "is the latest in mobile
ground-to-air defense. The portable Level
10, shoulder-mounted phaser cannon, Model
II."
"Makes you wonder what Model I was like."
"Model I blew up during field testing and
destroyed half of Pluto. No one cared--it was
a boring planet, anyway." Then, when he saw
Riker's expression, he grinned, showing
slightly irregular teeth. "I'm kidding,
Lieutenant."
"I knew you were," Riker lied. "How
powerful is that thing?"
"On full strength, I'd probably have a
shot at knocking one of Betazed's moons out of
orbit."
"You're kidding again."
Tang looked at him, his face inscrutable.
"I didn't say I'd have a good shot at it."
He placed the gun back on the wall and
took a couple of small target-practice
phasers out of their mountings. "Come on. I'll show
you what we got set up."
He led Riker over to another area, which was
somewhat darkened, and handed him one of the phasers.
Then from his belt he unclipped a couple of
small, diamond-shaped devices. "Standard
issue for ground security," he said. "Keeps
us from getting stale no matter where we are."
He tossed them into the air, and on their own, they
started hurtling around the chamber. "Pick your shot
and start firing, Lieutenant."
Back to back, Riker and Tang began firing
at the diamonds, trying to nail them in
midflight. They glistened as they darted about the
room, bobbing and weaving in no particular pattern.
Riker managed to land a couple of shots; Tang
landed far more.
And as if the tricky piece of firing only
required part of his attention, Tang said, "It's
a woman, isn't it."
"Pardon?"
"One of the local girls, like you said you were going
to be going out with. She's got you hooked ... no
disrespect intended."
"I'm not hooked, Sergeant. They have
interesting philosophies. I'm trying to understand
them."
"How much philosophy do you need to get through
life? If something attacks you, shoot it. If
it doesn't attack you, leave it alone.
Everything else is just window dressing."
"That's a very narrow mind-set, Sergeant."
"That mind-set is what keeps you alive,
Lieutenant Riker. I'm still here. My men
share my mind-set. They're still here. That's all
that matters."
"Hello, W."
The two men stopped and turned, and there stood
Wendy Roper. She was wearing a white
jumpsuit that clung to her like a second skin.
"Hi, Sergeant."
"Ma'am," acknowledged Tang.
She turned back to Riker and wasn't able
to hide the disappointment in her face. "Will ...
I haven't seen you around much."
"I, um ... I've been very busy lately,
Wendy."
"Really?" she said with a pert angle of her
head. "Doing what?"
"I've ..."
"The lieutenant has mostly been
preoccupied with perimeter inspections, ma'am,"
Tang said stiffly. "^w on the line is that
we're ripe for an attack at any time."
"Yes, anytime," echoed Riker.
"A great deal of time being spent in security
procedures. All out of concern for your safety,
ma'am."
"I see. Well ... when you do have some free
moments, Lieutenant ... it'd be nice to get
together. I thought we were hitting it off rather well."
She nodded to Tang. "Good seeing you,
Sergeant." And she walked off. Riker could hear
her light footsteps receding up the stairs.
"She's a nice girl," Tang observed.
"Very pleasant companion, I'd think. And best
of all--no offense intended--not overly
intellectual, if you catch my drift."
"I'd have to agree."
"But I take it she's not the young lady ...?"
"No. She's not."
"Never burned the candle at both ends,
Lieutenant?"
Riker looked at him askance. "You mean
juggled more than one relationship at a time?"
"If you want to put it that way, sir, yes."
"To be honest ... yes. But somehow, until
I get things sorted out with Deanna--"
"Deanna's the local girl?"
"Yes. I don't know how to put it,
Sergeant, but it wouldn't seem ... I don't
know ... right somehow."
Tang made a disapproving clucking noise.
"Bad sign, Lieutenant. Very bad sign.
Shields up, proceed with caution."
"Noted and logged, Sergeant. Oh, by the
way." Riker started targeting the flying
diamonds again. "You didn't have to lie for me
to Wendy."
"I know, sir. On the other hand, I'm rather
experienced with laying down covering fire. Just
consider it all part of the service."
"Well ... it's appreciated. I didn't
exactly know how to tell her about Deanna ...
especially when I'm not even sure if there's
anything to tell."
"No problem, Lieutenant."
"I haven't even seen her in close to a
week. Maybe I should head over to the university
where she's got classes ..."
Tang shook his head violently, although it did
nothing to spoil his shot. "Big mistake, sir.
Very big mistake. Keep in mind that she
hasn't heard from you either. Now either that's weighing
on her mind, in which case you should just let it simmer
until she can't stand it anymore, or else
she's not thinking about you at all, in which case you
certainly don't need her. But you go pursuing
her, you're giving her the strategic advantage.
Not a good maneuver at all."
"You make it sound like a military
campaign."
Tang looked at him. "Well, sir ...
they do call it the war of the sexes. Wars are
wars. Strategies are strategies. And winning"
--Tang fired again, in rapid succession, and this
time nailed both floating diamonds dead center,
disengaging them. They clattered to the floor--?is
what counts."
"Winning isn't everything, Sergeant."
"Winning isn't everything, sir ... but losing
isn't anything."
Riker tried to come up with a response to that, but
couldn't. "That's true, I suppose."
"Can't claim credit for it, sir. I wa
s
told a twentieth-century philosopher came
up with that. They sure knew their stuff back
then."
"What philosopher?"
Tang paused and frowned. "Can't say I
rec--wait. I do remember. His name was
Charlie Brown."
Riker considered it and nodded. "This Charlie
Brown must have been a very wise man."
"I expect he was, sir. I expect he
was."
CHAPTER 21
Mark Roper was chuckling. "So when do I get
my two hundred credits?"
They were seated across from each other at the
caf@e, where meeting for breakfast had evolved
into a morning ritual. Riker looked up at
Roper innocently while buttering a piece of
rye toast. "What do you mean?"
"The two hundred credits you owe me over the
bet about Deanna."
"I've got considerably more time on that,
don't you think, Mark?" said Riker evenly.
"Time?" Roper laughed. "Captain, time
doesn't make any difference. She's cut
ties with you. Now or doomsday won't make
any difference. It's not going to happen.
Lwaxana told me--"
"She told you what?" demanded Riker, his
eyes turning keen and a bit angry. "When did
you speak to her?"
"Casual conversation a week or so ago."
"Why didn't you tell me?" He crunched
down on the toast.
"I am telling you. Frankly, you weren't
even the topic of conversation. We were comparing notes
about the difficulties of raising daughters. And
Lwaxana was boasting about how Deanna listens
to, and does, everything Lwaxana tells her to do
because she has Deanna so well trained in her
responsibilities as a daughter of the Fifth
House. And an example she gave was how she
shut down the relationship between Deanna and "t
Starfleet fellow"' because it wasn't
appropriate."
"Oh, she did," said Riker icily.
"Odd. That's not how I see it."
"I don't imagine you would see it that way,"
was Roper's calm response. He speared a
piece of egg and said, "But then again ... I
suppose how you see it doesn't matter all
that much, does it, Captain?"
Riker looked daggers at Roper, but the older
man was the picture of tranquillity. And why
shouldn't he be? As far as he was concerned, he'd
won a two-hundred-credit bet.
But Riker saw it a bit differently.
The problem was, Sergeant Tang had made
a valid point. Running in pursuit of
Deanna, making calls to the mansion, trying
to start things up when she was clearly so intimidated
by her mother ... it didn't sound like a pleasant
experience. The question was, which was the potentially more
humiliating? Throwing himself at Deanna? Or
losing the bet?
He kept hearing Tang's voice in his head,
warning him about strategy. Warning him ...
... his voice in his head.
That's when it hit him.
The next day, after an early-morning meeting with
Tang to review the latest Starfleet reports
about raider activity, Riker headed over to the
university. He staked out a place for himself,
seated on the edge of a large, ornate
sculpture in the middle of the campus. And he
simply waited. Sooner or later, Deanna
was going to have to pass by.
He spent half a day there, watching the sun
pass over in the sky, watching the shadows shift
position. They were simple, meaningless things. But
he stared at them, focused on them, practicing.
And as he did so, he slowed down his breathing,
drawing out each breath. In through the nose, out through the
mouth.
He did so with more than just an interest in finding
his calm, inner self. He had a purpose, a
drive to his actions. He used the urgency and
determination to focus his thoughts, focus everything he
did.
He had completely lost track of time, but
something made him look up.
There she was.
She was walking across the campus, chatting with a
couple of friends. She was laughing at something, andfora
flash of an unreasonable instant, Riker felt
tremendous resentment. Why should she be cheerful when
he was feeling so much mental clutter?
But that wasn't what this was about. He couldn't
submit to that clutter; he had to brush away the
confusion, concentrate fully on the matter at
hand.
He didn't look at her. Instead he was
staring at the lengthening shadows, once again performing the
steady in-and-out breathing. He reached down into himself,
down into that determination that fueled the drive of his
career. Except now that core of energy was going
to fuel something else.
He felt it welling up inside him, felt--
or at least hoped he felt--the ability, the
potential, there for him to tap. And now he sought out
Deanna.
There she was, her measured strides having
taken her only a couple of meters beyond where she
had been before. And she was looking his way.
Apparently she had just noticed him, and
she gently elbowed one of her girlfriends and nodded
in Riker's direction. The other girl looked,
too, and all three of them seemed to be sizing him
up for a moment before putting their heads together and
giggling.
And Riker took Deanna's image, took
a mental snapshot, and imprinted it onto his
mind. And then he cut loose in an
undisciplined, inelegant burst.
You're afraid of me, he informed her.
The reward to his herculean effort was immediate.
Deanna was thrown off-step, and her head snapped
around in astonishment. She looked right at him, and
on her face was utter shock.
To her credit, she recovered immediately. She
fell back into step and made every effort to act as
if nothing unusual had happened.
But Riker knew, dammit, he knew.
He tried to send again, but now his thoughts were
cluttered, whirling and flushed with the excitement of his
success. He couldn't pull himself together again fast
enough--he hadn't developed nearly enough
discipline.
He realized that he'd had the equivalent of
beginner's luck. That didn't change the fact,
though, that he had let Deanna know precisely
what he was thinking. He had, in essence, thrown
down the gauntlet right on her own turf of the
mind.
She studiously looked away from him as she and
her friends made their way across the campus.
Deanna had, in fact, picked up the pace.
It was clear to Riker why: she was concerned that he was
going to come running after her.
However, he had no intention of doing that. In
fact, when Deanna was almost out of sight, she
risked a quick glance behind her. All she saw was
Riker sitting precisely where he had been before,
his legs crossed, looking like a smug Bu.ha.
Riker was sound asleep when an insistent
rapping came at his door. He sat up in
confusion, checking his chronometer. It was the middle
of the night.
The first thought he had was that there was some sort of
attack. He tossed the blanket around himself and
ran to the door.
Deanna was standing there, her arms folded, her
eyes bright.
"I am not afraid of you."
It took a moment for Riker to shift gears and
realize that there was no danger from imminent alien
assaults. Still, he composed himself quickly. "You
could have fooled me."
"Obviously you're not all that difficult
to fool. On what grounds do you say that I'm
afraid of you?"
"On the grounds that you cut off all communication
with me. On the grounds that you're steering clear of
me."
"I cut off communication with you because, as far as
I was concerned, I had better things to do with my time
than devote it to someone who couldn't possibly
understand the subtleties of our philosophies."
"Well, obviously I'm understanding something,"
he said, leaning against the doorframe, "because I
projected thoughts to you."
"A fluke. Pure happenstance. Besides, you
didn't do it for the satisfaction of opening up your
mind. You did it so that you could get my attention;
maybe even get back at me, in some crude
way. As for steering clear of you, my presence here
should be enough to show how ridiculous that is. On what
grounds can you--?"
"On the grounds," Riker interrupted
remorselessly, "that every time you're close to me you
start to lose control. Your body starts sending you
signals that your brain doesn't want to accept.
Face it, Deanna ... I'm upsetting your
nice little intellectual applecart."
Her gaze was steady and unrelenting. "Get
dressed."
"Where are we going?"
"Out."
"Where? Why should I go with you if you won't
tell me where it is we're going."
She looked at him defiantly. "What's the
matter, Lieutenant, afraid of me?"
"All right," he said after a moment. "Give
me a couple of minutes."
"Take all the time you want."
It was a fairly warm night. Where Deanna
stood, she was framed in the moonlight reflecting
off a large lake, providing some degree of
illumination. Her arms were crossed as if she were
cold.
