Chapter Sixteen
PICARD WAS REVIEWING their battle plan for perhaps the seventh or eighth time when he heard the sound of chimes. Turning to his ready room door, he said, “Come in.”
As the door slid aside, Gerda Idun walked in. She was perturbed by something, if the captain was any judge of such things.
“What can I do for you?” he asked.
“You’ve been very kind to me,” Gerda Idun said. “Kinder than I would ever have imagined.”
“It was nothing,” Picard said.
She shook her head. “It wasn’t nothing. You’ve gone out on a long and very uncertain limb for someone you don’t know—and at one time, didn’t even trust. But I can’t ask you to go out on it any further.”
Picard leaned back in his plasticform chair. “What are you saying? That we need not place ourselves in any more danger for the sake of your transport?”
Gerda Idun nodded. “That’s what I’m saying. It’s what I have to say, if I’m to live with myself.”
He regarded her. “That’s gallant of you, Lieutenant. And much appreciated. However, you deserve a chance to return home.”
She pulled out the chair on the other side of his desk and placed her hands on the polished, black surface. Had anyone entered the room at that moment, they would have thought she was pleading with him for her life.
But it was just the opposite. Gerda Idun was asking him to help her give it up.
“There are a great many people on this ship,” she said. “They all have homes to return to just as I do—and people in those homes who will miss them if they fail to come back. I can’t ask your entire crew to risk its lives so the needs of a single person can be accommodated.”
The captain considered the woman’s words for a moment. “It is true,” he conceded finally, “that you cannot ask them to assume that risk.” He paused. “But I can.”
Gerda Idun looked annoyed—a strange thing indeed, under the circumstances. “Why?” she asked. “Because you’re their commanding officer?”
“That is correct,” said Picard. “But not just because I am their commanding officer. I can ask them to do this because they trust me, and because they know I would not ask them to do anything I would not do myself.”
Gerda Idun shook her head. “Please, it’s not fair to—”
He held up a hand for silence. “It is eminently fair. You talk about not being able to live with yourself. How will my crew feel if they do not at least make an attempt to send you home? How easy will it be for them to live with themselves?”
Her nostrils flared. “They don’t have any obligation to me. I’m not part of your Starfleet…or your Federation. I’m a stranger to them.”
“Perhaps,” said Picard. “But can you honestly tell me you would shy away from danger if the tables were reversed—if it were one of my people in your universe, and you had the power to return him or her to us?”
His ready room was never really silent, what with the gentle drone of the engines and the soft whisper of the ventilation system. But it had never been quieter than at that moment.
Gerda Idun sighed. “It’s times like these,” she said, “when I wish I were a better liar.”
The captain smiled. “Rest assured, I would not send my ship and crew on a suicide mission. I sincerely believe we can do this and still emerge in one piece.”
She shook her head. “I don’t know what to say.”
“Say you will speak kindly of us when you return to your proper universe. That will be all the thanks we require.” He indicated his monitor with a tilt of his head. “Now, if you will excuse me, we have work to do—all of us.”
Gerda Idun nodded. “Of course.” And without another word, she left the room.
A most remarkable woman, Picard mused. Then he turned back to his monitor and reviewed their battle plan all over again.
Vigo peered around the bend in the corridor, then pulled his head back and regarded his comrades.
Both Sebring and Runj were eager to strike back at the rebels. They hung on the Pandrilite’s words as if they were the riches of some lost civilization.
“Two guards,” Vigo mouthed, holding a pair of fingers up for emphasis. “Ten meters away.” He pointed to his chest and shook his head from side to side. “They don’t know we’re coming.”
Sebring and Runj nodded to show they understood.
Vigo held his phaser at the ready and counted. “One…two…three!”
Leading the charge down the corridor, he took aim at the nearer of the two guards and skewered him with a bright red beam. As he fell, the other guard realized what was happening and got a shot of his own off.
It scorched the wall to Vigo’s right, missing both him and his comrades. Before the rebel could get a second chance, Vigo fired again and sent him sprawling.
That left the room they were watching unguarded. As Runj ran past its entrance to cover them against any other rebels who happened by, Vigo deactivated its transparent barrier.
There were six people inside—the installation’s entire complement of security officers. The Pandrilite recognized the woman with the braided black hair who had given Idun clearance to land their shuttle.
Echevarria, he recalled.
“How did you get here?” she asked Vigo.
“Ejanix helped us.”
“He’s free?” Echevarria asked, her voice a mixture of happiness and surprise.
“Yes” was all Vigo chose to say, since there was no time to tell her the whole story. He jerked a thumb over his shoulder in the direction they had come from. “We were back there. Do you know where they’re holding the other engineers?”
She shook her head. “But there are only a few other storage rooms. The engineers are probably in one of them.”
Sebring tossed her one of the guards’ phasers, keeping the other one for himself. “Let’s get going,” he said, “before they realize what we’re up to.”
It was good advice. But with only four phasers among them, it didn’t make sense for all of them to go after the engineers.
Echevarria must have come to the same conclusion, because she turned to a Bolian and said, “They might not have found the phaser cache.”
The Bolian nodded. “On our way.”
Then the two groups split up. The Bolian led the other unarmed security officers in one direction and Echevarria led Vigo, Sebring, and Runj in the other.
But freeing the security people had slowed them down. They would have to move even more quickly now if they were going to stop Kovajo.
Picard was in his quarters, trying to get some much needed sleep, when he was prodded into wakefulness by an insistent and all-too-familiar voice.
“What is it?” he asked finally, propping himself up on an elbow.
“I’m done,” said Simenon over the intercom.
“Done?” Picard echoed dully.
“With the transporter system.”
The captain winced at the engineer’s tone. Of course, it seemed to say, what else would I be done with?
“You’re prepared to send Gerda Idun back?” the captain asked, just to make certain.
“As prepared as I’ll ever be,” Simenon told him.
Picard absorbed the information. Then he said, “Stand by, Mr. Simenon. Picard out.”
Pushing aside his covers, he swung his legs out of bed, planted his bare feet on the room’s carpeted floor, and took a deep breath to clear away the cobwebs. Then he looked up at the intercom grid embedded in the ceiling and said, “Picard to Commander Ben Zoma.”
“Ben Zoma here,” came the reply.
“Mr. Simenon says he’s ready to return to the anomaly. Make sure everyone else is. I’ll be on the bridge in ten minutes.”
“Aye, sir,” said Ben Zoma.
Picard padded across the room and got a fresh uniform out of his closet. That way, he could at least look rested as he took the Stargazer into battle.
From her post at navigation, Gerda saw Ben Zoma l
ook about the bridge at his officers. To her mind, they all seemed ready and alert.
“You heard the man,” the first officer told them. “Ten minutes until we head back to the anomaly.”
Gerda turned to her sister. As if she sensed the scrutiny, Idun looked back at her.
The odds were stacked against them, the navigator reflected. They were going into battle against forces significantly greater than their own.
If they were to have any chance to succeed, Gerda and her twin would have to work together as they always had—in perfect coordination and harmony. That meant putting their differences aside, no matter how heartfelt they might be.
For the sake of her captain and her crewmates, Gerda had decided to make that sacrifice. She just hadn’t known if she was alone in that regard.
But the look in Idun’s eye was unequivocable. It told Gerda with ironbound certainty that her sister felt exactly the same way.
Gerda Idun sat down in front of the computer console in her quarters and tried to clear her head. She had anticipated a lot of things when she materialized on this ship, but seeing Andreas Nikolas wasn’t one of them.
Of course, it should have been. She had fully expected to see counterparts of all her other comrades here, even one of herself. But not Nikolas. After all, he was dead.
But only in her universe. In this one, he was still very much alive, as she had so intimately discovered a mere few hours ago. She found herself smiling yearningly at the thought of it and forced herself to stop.
She and Nikolas couldn’t be together. She was going back to her own universe, just as she had told him, and it was impossible for her to take him along. It was that simple.
So why couldn’t she stop thinking about him? And why had she spent the night with him, knowing full well it could never happen again?
Because I’m weak, Gerda Idun told herself. But she couldn’t afford to be weak any longer. Focusing on the task at hand, she punched a command into her console.
Fortunately, the Stargazer’s computer system wasn’t very different from the one on her own ship, and what differences existed were easy enough to pick up. She sailed past them, racing unerringly toward her goal….
The crew’s level-two personnel files, unrestricted because they didn’t contain any sensitive information.
Gerda Idun knew that if she opened them, it would become a matter of record in the ship’s data banks. However, she doubted that the notation would raise any eyebrows in the short time she had left here—especially since, as a newcomer to this universe, it was only natural for her to be curious about the Stargazer’s crew, and the personnel files were the most logical way to satisfy that curiosity.
Not that Gerda Idun was interested in all the files. Far from it. In point of fact, she was interested in only one file. But to cover that up, she opened several others first—starting with Paxton’s and then making her way through Joseph’s, Greyhorse’s, and Kastiigan’s.
En route, she learned that Paxton was an expert skier, that Joseph had an allergy to bananas, and that Kastiigan was older than he looked. But none of that mattered to her.
All that mattered, all that she cared about, lay in one file in particular—the one on Phigus Simenon.
Taking a deep breath, Gerda Idun opened it. Then she read through it slowly and carefully, taking the time to scan related links when necessary. Finally, she switched to yet another file—Commander Wu’s, as it happened—and left it open while she sat back and considered what she had just learned.
He was Gnalish, just as he appeared. He had graduated from Starfleet Academy with degrees in quantum mechanics, warp field physics, and starship engineering. And his first assignment was on the Fearless, an Excelsior-class vessel.
Interestingly enough, Simenon hadn’t distinguished himself on the Fearless. Apparently, he hadn’t gotten along very well with some of his colleagues, including his section chief. After less than a year, he wound up on the Onjata—a smaller, older, and apparently less prestigious ship.
But it was in the cramped quarters of the Onjata’s engine room that Simenon thrived, and was recognized time and again for his insights and ingenuity. As his superiors retired or managed transfers to more prominent vessels, he moved up the chain of command and became the Onjata’s chief engineer.
Simenon served in that capacity for six and a half years despite constant overtures from other captains, obviously content to be a big fish in a little sea. Then the Onjata was decommissioned, forcing his hand.
He chose to go to the Stargazer, a spanking-new Constellation-class ship, instead of another old clunker. But he wound up serving with distinction there, first under a man named Ruhalter and later under Captain Picard. And that was all his file said about him.
Funny, Gerda Idun thought. She had expected to see more superlatives. Complimentary as it was, Simenon’s file didn’t say he was the most brilliant engineer in the fleet.
And that’s what she needed him to be—the brightest, most resourceful, most innovative engineer anywhere around. The top of the line. So much depended on it…
So very much.
But she wasn’t worried on that count. Joseph had told her what a brilliant fellow Simenon was, and others on the ship seemed to share his opinion.
No, Gerda Idun had been more concerned about quirks that might have turned up in the Gnalish’s medical history—quirks that might have proven stumbling blocks to her realizing her objective.
But she hadn’t discovered any. As far as she could tell, there was nothing to stop her—nothing at all.
Closing Wu’s file, she opened yet another one—Lieutenant Chiang’s. Then she closed her eyes as she went over what she had to do.
Chapter Seventeen
THIS TIME, Vigo let Echevarria peek around the corner. After all, she knew the place a lot better than he did.
When she pulled her head back back, she told the weapons officers that there were four rebels standing guard outside the storage room. That meant there was something important within, something that needed to be guarded.
It was either the engineers or something equally valuable to the intruders. Prototypes of the tactical devices they had come to steal, perhaps.
In any case, it would be harder to surprise four than two. This could get messy, Vigo told himself.
“Hit them hard,” Echevarria whispered to them, “and don’t stop until you secure that room. Got it?”
The weapons officers all nodded. Then they waited for Echevarria to make the first move—and went in right after her.
It was messy, all right—but mostly for the rebels. They were standing so close together, they had a difficult time firing back without hitting each other.
Vigo and Runj each cut down an intruder before the others began to return the favor. For a long, tense moment, the corridor was filled with slashing beams of lurid red light. Then another rebel fell, and the last one darted into the room rather than stand alone.
As Echevarria had enjoined them, they pelted down the hall to press their advantage—and it cost them. Three or four beams came slicing out of the doorway at once, forcing them to plaster themselves against the wall to their right.
Of the four of them, only Echevarria didn’t move quickly enough. Taking a blast to the shoulder, she flew into the left-hand wall and spilled to the floor. Vigo couldn’t tell if she was dead or alive, but her uniform was a smoking ruin where the beam had struck her.
He felt his jaw clench. If they remained where they were, any one of them could be next.
Rather than retreat or wait to be picked off, Vigo did the last thing his adversaries would expect. He ran down the corridor, went into a shoulder roll, and fired into the room.
By the time he came up again, he could see that his maneuver had dropped one of the rebels on the threshold. Better yet, the others had pulled back out of sight, giving Sebring and Runj a chance to advance.
Taking advantage of it, they pelted down the corridor and launched themselves in
to the room. Still following Echevarria’s advice, Vigo went in after them.
It was another storage chamber, as Echevarria had indicated, but it was a lot bigger than the others and a lot more crowded with heavy metal supply containers. It was also seething with phaser fire, beam after crimson beam searing the air.
Vigo squeezed off a burst as he dove for cover behind the nearest cluster of containers. Then he poked his head out and tried to get a sense of the rebels’ positions.
It seemed to him there were at least six of them, probably more. Obviously, they hadn’t had any tactical training, because they had allowed themselves to be cut off from the door—their only means of escape.
Also, the rebels seemed to have gathered into two distinct groups—one in each of the room’s back corners. That made it easier for Vigo to deal with them.
It also presented him with an opportunity—because there was a tall stack of containers in the back left corner, just behind where the rebels seemed to be hiding.
A directed-energy poke in the right place and that heavy metal stack might be encouraged to topple. And if it did, it would topple on the rebels.
Sebring and Runj, who were hunched behind a collection of containers off to his left, might have seen the possibility too. But it didn’t matter. Only Vigo had the angle.
He waited for a respite in the storm of red fury coming from the rebels. Then he raised himself high enough to look over the tops of the containers in front of him, took aim, and fired a beam across the room.
It was answered instantly with another barrage, forcing him to duck again. But Vigo’s beam had done its work, knocking one of the lower containers askew.
A moment later, he heard cries of surprise and apprehension as the other containers in the stack came crashing down.
Vigo ventured a look in that direction and saw that it was quiet. No phaser beams stabbing at him, no glimpses of movement. Apparently, his maneuver had worked—leaving only one nest of rebels to contend with.
Then—perhaps out of fear that the weapons officers would try the same thing on them—two other rebels darted from cover and tried to make a break for it.
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