Ship of the Line

by Diane Carey

  “Sir,” he forged on, “despite the handsome reports of all your department officers that the starship is ready for warp speed, there are ten thousand bugs that haven’t been worked out. War games are inefficient methods for working out those bugs. We haven’t even had her up to maximum warp yet. Even the hull bolts are untried. Doing this so close to the Klingon Neutral Zone at a time when there are hostilities with the Klingons—”

  “I’m used to hostilities with the Klingons, remember?”

  “Captain, that was ninety years ago!”

  “Ninety-three.”

  Abruptly defiant, Bateson’s voice flared. Apparently, sensing he was about to be insulted, he was all done being gentle.

  “That’s all we ever had, was hostility,” Bateson went on, now that they had everybody’s attention, and that meant everybody including the squishy life-form sitting on the deck with its big black eyes blinking and tentacles around both of La Forge’s legs. “What’s so different?”

  Riker deliberately leaned forward, knowing he was stepping over the line of decorum.

  “What’s different is that they’ve had ninety years to think about things you’ve missed. They’re different, Captain, don’t you realize that?”

  “Klingons are Klingons,” Bateson said. “They can’t have changed that much.”

  Standing up now, Bateson met Riker’s challenge head-on. From Riker’s point of view, the captain stood bracketed by the presence on the upper deck of Montgomery Scott on one side and, ironically, Data on the other.

  “You people have never fought Klingons,” Bateson declared. “I have.”

  “Maybe not,” Riker said, “but we have fought alongside them.”

  Unaffected, Bateson blinked at him. How could he be so blasted casual?

  “Will, I don’t care if your mother and two of your sisters are Klingons. Your ships are a little faster than ours were and a little tougher, but you’ve never really fought Klingons. You don’t know what they’re like to fight. I do. That’s the first, best rule of any engagement. Know your enemy. You don’t know them. I know them.”

  The resonance of the captain’s voice carried with it a confidence that was both damnable and formidable. Riker at the moment could think of nothing to say. There was an irritating sense in what the captain said, and he was the only one who had actual events to back him up. He was the one who had stood off impossible Klingon odds in the past, though far past.

  Cocking a hip, Bateson let the words ring, then lowered his chin and held out a flat hand.

  “You want a shuttlecraft? You want to get off? You and your friends? There’s the door.”

  The offer took Riker so utterly by surprise that it also put the argument into perspective—an argument about which there had not yet been an incident. Bateson, who remembered that, was keeping his temper and now had parried Riker into a corner.

  Getting ready to box his way out, Riker settled back on his heels, took a deep breath, held it, and glanced at Troi and Geordi. Intensity of the moment traveled a psychic channel between them, and Troi reacted as if she’d been pinched. Her gaze attempted to express what lips failed to form. She and Geordi were holding their breaths too.

  So were Scott and—well, Data would’ve held his if he’d had any.

  “That’s uncalled for, sir,” Riker said. “This ship is brand-new and untried. We’re about to tarnish her image before she even has a reputation.”

  Not bothered by the fact that he’d just deeply disturbed several of the officers on his bridge, Bateson speared Riker with a glare.

  “Oh, well, Hell, commander, wouldn’t want that to happen! Maybe it’s too high a standard for you, but we’d better have people out here in these ships who believe in the ships. I don’t want you here if you don’t want to be here. You’re grown-ups. Make a decision.”

  Very clear. He wasn’t a by-the-book kind of man. They either accepted him for their captain or they didn’t, and he apparently thought senior officers ought to be able to pick.

  Or maybe he didn’t, and he was just aware of the special circumstances of their being here. Riker couldn’t really tell. Bateson obviously didn’t want to start his command under a cloud of resentment—and, yes, he was right, they did resent him.

  “That won’t be necessary, sir,” Riker assured. “May I respectfully recommend that shields not be reduced in power during the war games?”

  “You may,” Bateson said. “Scotty, please explain it to Mr. Riker.”

  Blinking out of his fascination with this flak, Scott said, “Shields have to be reduced in correlation with the reduction in phaser power, or else the sensors couldn’t measure hull impact and record damage potential accurately.”

  “Thank you. Satisfied?”

  Unfortunately . . . “Yes, sir.”

  “Very well. Now that we’re finished dancing, let me explain the scenario of the war games. Everyone pay attention. The Nora Nicholas is a Starfleet fighter-class ship already dispatched to the Typhon Expanse, where as we damned well know there are plenty of places to hide. The mock confrontation is for us to hunt down and engage a border raider that has been disrupting shipping, participating in smuggling operations, and brokering contraband and counterfeit credits.”

  “Counterfeit credits?” Riker interrupted. “We don’t have that problem anymore. Media of exchange can’t be counterfeited anymore.”

  “You’re deluding yourself.” Bateson flatly said. “People are more creative than that. Have you ever worked anywhere other than Starfleet?”

  “No, sir, I went directly—”

  “Well, I have. Outside of Starfleet, there’s a universe bubbling with commerce, legal and illegal. You’re living in the insulated world of knowing where your next meal is coming from, Commander.”

  “And you’re living in the past,” Riker challenged. He paused, then squared his shoulders and loftily raised his chin. “We don’t concern ourselves with such things in our century. We aren’t interested in personal enrichment. In this century, we strive to better ourselves.”

  Now Bateson was the one to pause. He leaned on the arm of his chair, surveyed Riker for a long, long time, and raised one eyebrow. All the men from the Bozeman now looked at Riker in the same way Bateson did. All the people from the Enterprise-D held very still.

  “Really . . .” the captain droned. “And just who is it you think you’re ‘better’ than?”

  Under the insulted gazes of the Bozeman’s brave crew, men who had stood down impossible odds with a ship one-tenth this size, William Riker’s shoulders sank a little and his chin came down. There was no good answer for that question. Not here, with Bateson’s crew silently surveying a man who had just declared himself superior without defining that.

  In Troi’s eyes and Geordi’s, he could see he had made a mistake. Only Data failed to indict him for some transgression, mostly because he couldn’t really figure out what was going on.

  Morgan Bateson gave Riker no quarter. Didn’t let him off. Didn’t stop glaring at him. He wanted an answer.

  Riker had never had to actually answer that before. He glanced around, broiling under the gazes of the Bozeman crew, who had indeed paid their dues every bit as much as he ever had.

  With his expression he offered a truce. “I’m sorry,” he appeased. “That did sound arrogant.”

  “Yes, it did.” Bateson still didn’t let him off the hook. “You people these days, you think you’re better than everybody. You look down your noses at the conflicts of the past as if we had wars because we thought they were fun. I’ve got news for you. It’s no fun. Someday you’re going to have to fight unthinkable odds too, and on that day you’ll remember me. You’ll find out that there comes a time when you have to stand up and hit somebody. And before you start looking at me like that again, remember that I didn’t build this floating fortress by myself.”

  “That doesn’t mean we have to bait potential enemies by staging war maneuvers in their front yards,” Riker said.

&nb
sp; Evidently Bateson had had this argument before. He was so relaxed he’d have stuck his hands in his pockets if he’d had any. Instead he just gripped the command chair and leaned on it. “But it does mean that we have to be prepared to fight and become familiar with the areas of space where the fighting will most likely take place.”

  “Sir, communication science is better than it was ninety years ago. You’re fooling yourself if you think they’re not watching every move this ship makes.”

  “I don’t know if that matters much,” Bateson said. “When you’re expecting a desert war, you don’t practice swimming. When we expect conflict in the Typhon Expanse, we don’t stage war games at Rigel. Starfleet crews have to be familiar with the conditions, anomalies, and cosmic configuration where the conflict might actually happen, don’t you agree?”

  “In theory, yes.”

  “That’s what we’re doing. Will, I’m not being contentious as a hobby. Some time after the Bozeman disappeared, peace broke out between the Federation and the empire. I’m one of those people who think we’re the only side really being peaceful. Just look at the Klingon Empire. It’s perfectly acceptable in political situations to gain by murder. A simple disagreement can mean a fight to the death. And we have a treaty with that! The Federation actually recognizes that as a legitimate government, and thereby we say it’s okay to behave like that!”

  “The Federation,” Riker told him sternly, “recognizes the High Council because it is the de facto government. We try not to make value judgments.”

  “Well, you’d better start making some. When I came forward in time ninety years, I was relieved that the Federation still existed. Then I paid closer attention. The Federation’s foreign policy these days is nothing short of burlesque.”

  “We’re at peace. Peace, Captain. With your attitude, do you even know what that means?”

  Apparently Riker hit a chord with that one. The captain lowered his chin and his eyes smoldered. “I know one of the charms of peace is putting off thinking about things that are ugly. The willful lack of candor and foresight are precisely the ingredients to create a catastrophe. Those who avoid the lessons of the past create conditions for the next disaster. It’s one of the worst mass delusions since Stanley Baldwin lied to the English people about the Luftwaffe. If you want peace, you must prepare for war.”

  Taking sustenance from Troi’s encouraging eyes, Riker shook his head in dismay and protested, “Captain, that is the most flagrantly irresponsible crock of paranoia I have ever heard. You should be ashamed of yourself.”

  “Maybe. But that last part wasn’t me talking.”

  Knowing he was being baited, Riker decided to field the blow. “All right, who was it?”

  “George Washington.” Cockily Bateson flared an eyebrow. “You want to tell him to be ashamed too?”

  Tipping his head, Riker accused, “Sir, are you comparing yourself to George Washington?”

  Bateson shrugged unapologetically. “We had better hold ourselves up to great people, or we will certainly fall short.”

  “Granted, but I honestly believe we’re provoking trouble by displaying our anticipation of it!”

  Furiously Riker pointed at the glittering panorama of the Typhon Expanse opening before them, hoping to make an illustration before one made itself.

  Unaffected by the bolt of volume from his unhappy first officer, Bateson looked at the forward screen for a few moments as if appreciating what he saw out there. An almost nostalgic quietude came over him, and his voice was now as mellow as Riker’s had been fierce.

  “If we stumble into a big problem five years from now with shrinking forces, obsolescing weapons, and a leadership that doesn’t know how to design a serious campaign, we won’t get much ballast out of saying, ‘Hey, we tried to be nice.’ The Federation can fall, Will. We can be overrun and we can be demolished. Complacency is a disgrace.”

  “Strong words, Captain,” Riker said, matching the lowered tone. “But I’m frankly terrified that a ship of this power is commanded by a man who thinks that ‘peace’ and ‘fooling ourselves’ are the same thing.”

  “I’ve told you you’re free to go,” Bateson offered again. “You can call it ‘peace,’ but I still don’t buy it. Do you, Mr. Scott?”

  “Never have, sir.”

  Experienced, tempered, and almost amused by what was going on here, Montgomery Scott was a full captain and that had to be considered. He was also one of James Kirk’s original crew and had pioneered the unknown reaches of space back when that really meant something. He was “Mister” on this voyage because there could only be one person called or referred to as “captain,” but that didn’t lessen the ballast of his opinion.

  Damn them both, Riker thought. This is making my teeth hurt. I’ve indulged in negotiations with sworn enemies that were more fun than this.

  “Mr. Scott,” he asked, “do you concur with this line of thinking?”

  “I do,” the famous veteran said. “And so do your admirals, who commissioned this ship.”

  “If the Federation knows what’s good for it,” Captain Bateson took over, “it’ll get ready to fight Klingons the old-fashioned way. You’d better start training your field operatives because there are things they have to know.”

  Irritated beyond temper now, Riker grumbled, “Sir, we do know how Klingons fight.”

  “No, you don’t. You’re only—what are you, thirty-five? The oldest active-duty admiral in Starfleet is only seventy-nine. You guys know how they wage a cold war, not a real war. But, believe me, the Klingons are always thinking about the real thing.”

  Again Riker scowled and raised his voice. “Respectfully submit, sir, the captain is obsessed with Klingons.”

  Bateson shrugged. “Maybe. What difference does that make? It doesn’t matter how we hone our skills as long as we hone them. If it’s not the Klingons, you can be sure it’ll be somebody else. Maybe somebody worse.”

  Troi by now was standing with her arms tightly folded, no longer pretending to work as the others were. There was a certain political decorum on the bridge when officers were having a dispute—keep to your work, keep your eyes on your board, and unless you’re invited into the conversation don’t even look in that direction. Almost everyone was managing to do that, except Mr. Scott, who didn’t care what anybody thought of him, and Deanna Troi. Her gaze reminded Riker sadly that Bateson could very well be right—the NCC 1701-D crew members had already wrangled with worse than the Klingons, and they probably would again.

  “Well, Mr. Riker?” Bateson asked directly. “Either comply, or lead a mutiny, or get off the ship. Now’s the time. You can think what you want about me. We don’t ignore Klingons where I come from.”

  Wishing he had never accepted this post, Riker thought bitterly of Captain Picard and endured a keen stab of loss. Perhaps it was only nostalgia. Perhaps it was something else.

  Haunted by actions he hadn’t even taken yet, he wondered—did he want to gain command by becoming this ship’s Fletcher Christian?

  And he had accepted the post.

  “I won’t be leaving until this shakedown cruise is completed,” he said, making the condition clear. “And you are the captain of the ship. I won’t be the one to change that, sir.”

  “Does that mean you’re complying with the plans as they stand?”

  “It does.”

  “Very well. Then carry on, Mr. Riker.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “Entering the lateral quadrant of the Typhon Expanse, sir.”

  “Acknowledged. Sound general quarters. Yellow alert.”

  At the comm station, Wizz Dayton responded to Bateson’s order in that clean, crisp way that had rumbled down through history, a series of relays and repeats that greatly reduced the chances of error.

  “General quarters, aye. All hands, battlestations. Go to yellow alert. Repeat, battlestations, yellow alert. Engineering, secure from warp speed. Go to full impulse.”

  Scott gave a satisfied
nod. “Full impulse, aye, sir.”

  “Somebody take George Hill below.”

  An ensign rolled out of his seat at the secondary science console. “Take George Hill below, aye.”

  As acting science officer, Lieutenant Wolfe instantly transferred the controls of that console over to his primary console. Riker watched with undeniable satisfaction at the efficiency of the crew. Everything, so far, seemed to be fine. Data at ops, Andy Welch at the helm, Gabe Bush in his second officer’s chair, Mike Dennis taking the position at tactical, Deanna Troi on her way into the turbolift to take her station at sickbay, Geordi LaForge at the impulse engineering console, and Mr. Scott at the main.

  Engineer Perry and a couple of others hurried into the auxiliary turbolift and headed back down to the engineering decks where they were stationed, replaced almost instantly by three armed Security guards who came out of the lift as the engineers went on. The three guards took positions at the lift doors and stood back, out of the action.

  “Mr. Riker,” Bateson addressed, taking his command chair, “defensive measures.”

  “Defensive measures, aye, sir. Weapons on standby, Mr. Data. Shields up. Confirm power reduction.”

  “Deflector shields up, weapons on line,” Data repeated studiously. “Power reduction confirmed, sir.”

  “Short-range scanners on full search mode.”

  “Full search, aye, sir,” John Wolfe responded from main science.

  “Threat assessment, tracking and targeting systems, confirm ready.”

  “Threat assessment ready, sir,” Wolfe reported.

  Data said, “Tracking and targeting systems read functional, sir.”

  Riker turned to Bateson. “All confrontational and response systems are standing by, sir.”

  “Thank you. Have a seat. This’ll be fun.”

  “Captain, picking up a warp trail already,” John Wolfe reported.

  “They’re here,” Bateson said. He patted his chair’s arm. “Now we’ll see what this debutante can do. Everybody keep your eyes open. We’ll probably have to take the first hit. After that, we’ll have a fix on the bogey. The first thing I want to do is take a series of his running fixes and plot his method of tight maneuvering. That’ll be you, Mike.”