Equinox - Diane Carey [34]
"You're the first friendly faces we've seen in months," Gilmore unburdened. "I'm glad we found you."
"The feeling's mutual," Chakotay said right away,
then determined to change the subject. "Those modified plasma injectors look elaborate. What were you trying to do?"
Her hands lost some of their color. "Oh... we were experimenting with ways to enhance our warp drive. But it didn't work."
Of course it didn't. They were a shipload of scientists with maintenance engineers on board. There was nothing innovative, not mechanically, about Equinox or her crew. Gilmore wasn't up to the task of modifying the warp drive. Chakotay doubted they'd have had the power to increase by more than one step in speed, and that wouldn't do much good this far out. He also knew she must understand that. Perhaps this was another result of utter desperation. Of course it was.
"Maybe we should let B'Elanna take a look," Kim suggested, not thinking of the facts the way Chakotay did.
"It won't work," Gilmore admitted. "We tried for months."
They paused as Naomi Wildman marched in through the port-side door and stalked right up to the table with the clarity of a six-year-old's determination. She offered a rehearsed stage smile and came to a mockery of attention, looking at Maria Gilmore.
"Hello there!" Gilmore greeted, obviously taken aback at the sudden appearance of a child.
"Commander, permission to interrupt?" the little girl asked Chakotay.
"Granted."
"Ensign Gilmore?"
Gilmore grinned. "That's right."
The child held out her hand. "Naomi Wildman. Captain's assistant."
"Is that so?"
"I wanted to officially welcome you aboard the Starship Voyager."
"Glad to be here."
"If you need anything," the little girl pressed on, "replicator rations, a tour of the lower decks, I'm your man!"
Gilmore smiled, and Chakotay tolerated the aberration of adult behavior, wondering if it wouldn't be nicer to see a child acting like a child instead of training to ape adult ways as if that were normal or even healthy for her. A kid should be a kid, not a crewman.
"Thank you, Miss Wildman," Gilmore accommodated. "I'll keep that in mind."
"As you were!" Naomi beamed into that stage smile again, about-faced, and left.
Gilmore watched her go, both touched and confused. "I didn't realize you had children on board," she said, without commenting on the weirdness.
"Only one," Kim said. "She was born here."
"I have a nephew," the unfortunate woman said, giving in a little. "Back on Earth .. . about the same age. Well, not anymore ... I guess he's a teenager by now. I probably wouldn't even recognize him."
Chakotay regretted that he hadn't managed to stave off the emotion even by cloaking it in engineering prattle. "You'll see him again," was all he could think to say.
It rang hollow and inadequate.
Before the moment could sour further, Gilmore's combadge buzzed with Captain Ransom's voice. "Ransom to Gilmore."
She touched the badge. "Yes, Captain?"
"Report to the Equinox bridge."
"On my way. Duty calls." She seemed relieved to get out of this.
Chakotay nodded his permission, even though she didn't need it when her captain was calling.
How much longer was he officially her captain? Chakotay had never been in this particular situation before. Would the shiftover take place when Equinox was cast adrift? That would be a hard moment for all of them, and it would create problems he didn't want to explore yet.
He would have to talk to Captain Janeway. Things would come up that they would have to iron out.
"Assemble a salvage team," Chakotay told Kim, trying to angle back to hard work rather than this haunting anguish that cloyed the decks.
"Aye, sir. She's nervous," Kim observed sadly as he watched Gilmore slip through the port door. "I think she's worried about letting their ship go. I guess it'd be hard to abandon a ship you'd fought so hard to save."
"Must've been like that for Shackleton," Chakotay mused.
Kim's boyish face crumpled. "Who?"