by David Mack
The sylphlike brunette shrugged. “It’s getting to be.” As if she’d suddenly become self-conscious now that no one was looking, she averted her eyes from La Forge’s and said, “We’d probably better get back to work.”
“Yeah, I guess so,” La Forge said as he helped Leishman disentangle herself from him. “Besides, it usually takes me three or four dates before I go this far.” Flashing a grin, he added, “I might be a cheap date, but I’m not easy.”
She climbed back down to the corridor and looked up at him. “Well, then, we might have a problem. Because I’m easy—but I’m not cheap.” She reached into her roll-up bag of specialty engineering tools, pulled out a flux coupler, and passed it up to him. “Take this,” she said. “You’ll need it to balance the plasma flow to the triquantum coil.”
Taking the tool, he didn’t know what to make of Leishman. Was she just goofing around to annoy Mirren, or had she actually been flirting with him? The question nagged at him from the back of his thoughts while he finished his adjustments to the new systems in the Aventine’s sensor grid. “That ought to do it,” he said as he deactivated the flux coupler. “Thanks for letting me go hands-on with this. It’ll make refitting the Enterprise’s grid a lot easier while you guys are off on your scouting run.”
“My pleasure,” Leishman said as La Forge climbed down and out of the Jefferies tube. He handed the coupler back to her. She turned to tuck it back into its pocket in her equipment roll-up, but then she turned back toward La Forge with a deeply thoughtful expression. “I just want to say, in case there was, you know, any confusion or anything about that whole business with us in the tube …”
“It’s okay,” La Forge said. “I understand. You were just kidding around.”
“No, I was totally hitting on you.” She turned away, jammed the flux capacitor into her bag, rolled it shut in a blur of motion, and fastened its magnetic strap. When she turned back, La Forge was still at a loss for words. “But I get it, sir. You’re just not that into me. It’s no big deal.” She picked up her bag and walked past La Forge, away down the corridor.
He called after her, “Can I buy you a drink sometime?”
She stopped and turned back. With a raised eyebrow, she asked, “Just a drink?”
He spread his arms in dismay. “Dinner?”
Her eyes narrowed in mock suspicion. “Appetizers?”
“Of course.”
Planting a hand on her hip, she asked with exaggerated doubt, “And dessert?”
“Naturally,” La Forge said, liking her style.
“And I’ll expect flowers or something pretty,” she said.
“Pushing your luck, aren’t you?”
“Easy but not cheap,” Leishman said. “Take it or leave it.”
He laughed and said, “Sold.”
“All right,” she replied. “As soon as this war’s over, you’ve got yourself a date.” Patting a bulkhead, she added, “You’ve got my number.” Then she turned and walked away around a bend in the corridor, leaving Geordi La Forge to wonder why this sort of thing didn’t happen to him more often.
His elation was short-lived as he considered the obstacle that lay in front of him. All I have to do to get a date with Mikaela is end the Borg invasion. If that’s her idea of being easy, I don’t even want to know what “not cheap” really means.
* * *
Dax followed the instructions of the Enterprise’s computer as she moved through the ship looking for Worf. Her visit to the 1701-E was unannounced, and she wanted it to stay that way, but it was making it hard to find her old Deep Space 9 comrade.
When she’d first beamed aboard, the computer had dutifully informed her that he was in the forward sensor control center. By the time she’d walked there, however, he’d long since gone. Another query of the computer had led her to the auxiliary phaser control compartment, where she was told by a helpful young Bolian chief petty officer that she’d just missed the XO.
Now she was riding in a turbolift down to the main engineering compartment, in the hope of catching up with him at last. The doors hushed open, and she stepped out into the frenetic activity of a massive repair effort. The sharp smell of scorched metal was heavy in the air, and the clangor of voices, plasma welders, and echoing announcements over the shipwide comm fused into a gray din of noise.
A team of engineers moved past her, escorting a convoy of antigravs loaded with newly fabricated replacement parts and stacks of optronic cable. Everywhere she looked, there were panels open on the bulkheads, revealing the ship’s inner machinery. She dodged clear of a hazard-suited duo of damage-control mechanics laden with tools.
“Excuse me,” she said to a passing ensign. “Have you seen Commander Worf down here?”
The frazzled-looking young Tellarite pointed back the way he’d come. “By the main reactor with Lieutenant Taurik.” Noticing the four rank pips on Captain Dax’s collar, he added belatedly, “Sir.”
“Thank you, Ensign,” Dax said, and continued on her way.
She found Worf exactly where the Tellarite had said, and the Klingon was still conversing with the Enterprise’s Vulcan assistant chief engineer. Not wanting to intrude or interrupt, she lingered several paces shy of being able to eavesdrop on them—not that she could have heard much in the clamorous bustle of the all-hands repair effort.
Taurik nodded and stepped away, and Worf turned to head toward the turbolift. His eyes widened as he saw Dax watching him, but he didn’t break stride as he passed her. “Are you returning my chief engineer?”
“He’ll be back any minute,” she said, falling into step beside him. “But I’m actually here to talk to you.”
His dark brows furrowed as he glanced sideways at her. “Is there something you need, Captain?”
She followed him into a waiting turbolift. “Can we drop the ranks and just go back to being friends for a minute?”
The doors closed, and Worf’s shoulders relaxed by only the slightest measure. He lifted his chin and softened his voice to a less authoritarian baritone. “Computer, hold turbolift.” A feedback tone from the overhead comm confirmed his order, and he looked at Dax. “I apologize,” he said. “Tracking the repairs is time-consuming.… Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” she said, touched as ever by his terse but genuine concern for her well-being. “It’s just that you and I haven’t talked since before I transferred to the Aventine, and suddenly I’m a captain. Must be weird for you.”
“How so?”
Dax didn’t know how to answer. In two words, he’d worked a dexterous bit of conversational judo and left her speechless. Reflecting on her feelings, she saw that she’d been wrong in her assumptions, and she decided to be honest with herself and with Worf. “Let me start over,” she said. “The truth is, I have no idea how you feel about my promotion. I was projecting my feelings about it onto you, and I shouldn’t have. I’m sorry.”
“You do not need to apologize,” he said.
She held up her palms, as if to deflect his gracious words. “No, I do, Worf. I should’ve given you more credit, but I was afraid you’d resent me for making captain ahead of you.”
He nodded. “Because of the reprimand I received after saving Jadzia on Soukara,” he said.
“Yes,” Dax said, relieved to have the matter in the open.
His sharp inhalation and heavy exhalation gave Dax ample notice that he was on the verge of saying something important. “I regret nothing that I did for Jadzia,” he said. “I accepted the consequences then, and now.” His stern features brightened. “You earned command by leading in battle. Jadzia would be proud of you—as I am. Your success honors her, and vindicates my decision to save her.”
The decorum of command was the only thing keeping Dax from becoming completely overwrought at Worf’s rare expression of his feelings for her, and for Jadzia. “Thank you, Worf. It means a lot to me to hear you say that. And for what it’s worth, I’ve never seen you look more relaxed and contented than you d
o right now.” A moment of self-doubt prompted her to ask, “I’m not just imagining that, am I? Are you happy with your life?”
He looked away for a moment, his demeanor pensive. Then he looked back and said, “The Enterprise is where I belong, and I consider it a great honor to be Captain Picard’s first officer.”
She reached out and rubbed his shoulder. “I’m glad.” Flashing a broad smile, she added, “Don’t get too settled in, though. I bet you’ll prove Captain Sisko wrong and have a ship of your own before long.”
“I am in no hurry.”
“Of course not,” Dax said. “You always did take your time.”
A low grunt rumbled in his chest before he said, “Computer, Deck Five,” and the turbolift hummed into motion.
Dax folded her hands behind her back as the lift made its rapid ascent. “It’s funny, isn’t it? Just at the point you and I are finally living up to our potential, the Borg are trying to exterminate us. What would you call that? Irony? Or tragedy?”
Worf grimaced. “Bad timing.”
8
“Strike team ready,” reported Lieutenant Pava Ek’Noor sh’Aqabaa, the tall, sinewy, and breathtaking Andorian shen who was filling in for the absent Ranul Keru at Titan’s security console.
Captain Riker wanted to be on his feet, moving from station to station, but he knew his role called for him to stay in the command chair and project certainty to his crew. His acting XO, Commander Fo Hachesa, double-checked the readouts on sh’Aqabaa’s console and nodded his confirmation to Riker.
At the aft science stations, chief engineer Ra-Havreii and the holographic avatar of science officer Pazlar were racing through their final adjustments. Ra-Havreii pivoted away from the console and declared, “Ready, Captain!”
“Engage!” Riker ordered.
Lieutenant Rager keyed in commands on the ops console. “Charging the inverters now,” she said.
“Power levels steady,” Pazlar said, watching the gauges on her station’s monitor. “Initializing subspatial trajector.”
“Calibrating targeting beam,” Ra-Havreii said, his own hands moving with speed and grace across his console’s controls.
Riker crossed his fingers. This was a plan that had a lot of ways to go wrong. Distilled to its essential elements, Titan would use a folded-space transporter—a technology with proven deleterious effects on organic tissue—to bypass the protective shell of black metal around the Caeliar’s hidden planet and sneak a strike team inside.
Because they had no way to scan the planet’s surface, Pazlar had estimated the likely size of the planet and the approximate thickness of the hollow sphere that surrounded it. The strike team, outfitted with orbital skydiving gear, would be shifted past the sphere into the planet’s atmosphere and free-fall to the surface. Once on the ground, they would don isolation suits to cloak themselves from the Caeliar, seek out the away team, and then, once they found them, trigger a transdimensional recall beacon.
Listening to the rapid volleys of technical information from one bridge officer to the next, Riker fixed his mien into a mask of calm resolve.
“Trajector at full power,” Pazlar said.
“Sensor module buffers holding,” Rager added.
Ra-Havreii chimed in, “No lock for the targeting beam.” He poked at the console controls. “There’s a multiphasic scrambling field inside the sphere,” he said.
Riker asked, “Can you break through it?”
“I’ll need more power,” Ra-Havreii said. “Increasing to five-eighty … five-ninety … six hundred.”
A droning whine began vibrating the deck. It made the bulkheads ring like a struck tuning fork.
“Feedback pulse,” Pazlar said, raising her voice over the rising hum. “We need to reduce power!”
“Negative,” Ra-Havreii said. “Increase to six-twenty-five, we’re almost through!”
Rager interjected, “Buffer overload!”
“It’s a transition rebound effect,” Ra-Havreii shouted back. “Negate it with a canceling frequency, quickly!”
A port-side engineering station erupted in a storm of shattered black polymer shrapnel and jetting sparks. The blast knocked Ra-Havreii off his feet and peppered his drooping white mustache and flowing white hair with smoldering motes, which he frantically finger-combed away before brushing clean his shoulders and chest.
Overhead, the lights flickered, and several consoles stuttered under the hands of people trying to keep them working. Pazlar reported with rising frustration, “Cascade failures in the sensor module! We’re losing the trajector’s targeting system!”
Hachesa stood close to Riker and bent low to offer in confidence, “I recommend we abort the mission, sir.”
Riker frowned at the Kobliad, even though he knew the acting XO was right. Then he nodded and said in a voice that cut through the din, “Abort mission. Rager, shut down the inverters. Lieutenant sh’Aqabaa, tell the strike team to stand down. Secure from Yellow Alert.” He saw Hachesa help Ra-Havreii stand up, and he said to the chief engineer, “Commander, deploy damage-control teams to the sensor module.”
“Aye, sir,” Ra-Havreii said, shaking off Hachesa’s hand and walking stiffly toward a functioning duty station.
All around Titan’s bridge, Riker saw dejected expressions, faces reflecting failure and disappointment. Looking over his shoulder, he saw Pazlar switch off a mission-command screen as she grumbled, “I guess that’s it, then.”
The bad morale had a toxic quality, one that Riker was determined not to grant a foothold on his ship. He stood and stepped forward to the center of the bridge. “Rager,” he said, “put me on a shipwide channel.”
The ops officer keyed in the command, turned her head back in his direction, and replied, “Channel open, sir.”
“Attention, all decks,” Riker said. “This is the captain. By now you’re very likely all aware that our latest rescue mission has not gone as planned.
“Though we’ve only been at this a short time, I’m sure some of you are beginning to harbor doubts about our chances for saving the away team—and ourselves. Given the obstacles that the Caeliar have left in our path, I can certainly understand why you might feel that way.
“But we aren’t going to give in to doubt or frustration or fear. I know that each time another plan fails, it seems like we’re running out of options. But I assure you, we’re not.
“Every step of the way we’re learning. Every failure teaches us something new. And if there’s one thing I know about Starfleet—and especially about this ship, and this crew—it’s that we’ve got a million tricks up our sleeves. If none of them work, we’ll pull out a million more. And a million after that.
“As long as our away team continues to be held prisoner on the surface, we will keep looking for a way to free them, and ourselves. We will use every means at our disposal, every technology we possess, to free ourselves.
“We will never relent, and we will never yield, no matter how long it takes—and we’ll all go home, together.”
He signaled Rager with a small slashing gesture beside his thoat to cut the channel, and then he returned to his chair. Pazlar and Ra-Havreii stood next to it. The science officer’s holographic avatar flickered and wavered a moment. “So,” Riker said to the pair, “what’s your next plan?”
“The way you were talking, I figured you already had one,” Ra-Havreii said, pinching another charred granule of companel composite from his singed mustache.
“Not yet,” Riker said. “But give me time, Commander. Give me time.”
* * *
Ranul Keru tried to keep an open mind as he wandered with Ensign Torvig through the deserted avenues of Axion, but there was something about the city that put him perpetually on edge. The morning was bright and beautiful, its air temperate, sweet, and mild in humidity. Sunlight glinted off surfaces in every direction. It was as pristine an urban environment as Keru had ever seen, yet everything about it sent a chill through him.
Torvi
g, on the other hand, gamboled from one discovery to the next, his curiosity insatiable. His sleek, ovine head bobbed and swiveled as he trotted along several meters ahead of Keru, with a tricorder clutched in one cybernetic hand. He pivoted back toward Keru just long enough to report, “I’m reading a new energy wave ahead.” Then he was off again, loping along through the gleaming canyon of bright metal and smoky crystal.
“Slow down, Vig,” Keru called ahead to his friend. “It’s a recon, not a race.”
The Choblik engineer didn’t seem to be listening to him. It was several minutes before Torvig halted long enough for Keru to catch up to him, and only then because he was engrossed in his study of a peculiar Caeliar construct by the side of the road. The three-meter-tall object was composed entirely of perfectly polished obsidian. Its base had a distinctly organic shape, but from a height level with Torvig’s shoulder—and Keru’s midriff—it became an asymmetrical fusion of hard angles and irregular polyhedrons. Some of its surfaces seemed to have been arbitrarily inscribed with symbols or characters of the Caeliar language.
Keru waited until he caught Vig sneaking a look back at him with one eye, and he asked the engineer, “Any clue what it is?”
“I have hypotheses,” Torvig said. He circled the object and kept his head only centimeters from its surface as he continued. “The shapes might be directional indicators. The inscriptions may denote the names of locations in the city, or perhaps distances to known places from this point.”
Narrowing his eyes at Torvig’s knack for complicating the simplest of answers, he replied, “You mean it’s a road sign.”
“Maybe,” Torvig said. “That’s only one possibility.” He stopped on the far side of the object from Keru, reached forward, and removed a loose piece, which was formed from the same ultrasmooth black stone. Shaped like a spike, it caught the sunlight and gave off indigo flashes as Torvig turned it in his left bionic hand while scanning it with the tricorder held in his right. His small mechanical appendages handled the object with tremendous dexterity and gentleness. “There is another piece like this one,” he said. “Identical in every way. Thirty-one centimeters in length. Weight, one hundred forty-one-point-seven grams. Variable diameter, from two-point-one centimeters along the majority of its length, tapering to zero-point-four centimeters before widening again at the end, before a final tapering. Most interesting.”
