Gateways 07_ What Lay Beyond - Diane Carey [130]
“You command them well. I am impressed.”
Rather than say anything, she leaned up, kissed him on the cheek and laughed as his eyes went wide. Davison, to her right, chuckled, and Worf left the bridge, his speed making the ambassadorial robes flutter.
“Time to rendezvous with the Trident and Excalibur,” Riker asked.
“Fourteen minutes,” Data responded.
The Enterprise had been cruising along at warp nine with no incidents. They had left the Petraw ships behind them ten hours earlier, allowing the crew to return to their normal routines. Which meant a rested Riker was in command and Picard was off-duty. People had time to eat or sleep, La Forge was able to run required diagnostics to prepare a maintenance schedule for their next stop at a starbase, and things were feeling normal for the moment.
Against all that, though, was the specter of chaos represented by the still-functioning gateways. Wars had broken out, natural disasters were occurring more frequently as the ancient technology began to harm the worlds it had once serviced. If Picard was right, the fourteen Resonators would either automatically close down the gateways, or at the least, give him control over them for the first time. If the latter, it represented awesome power and crushing responsibility. Starfleet, though, trusted him to make the right decision, since he had not once let them down.
Riker also took time to quickly review what he knew of the ships he was meeting. The Excalibur he had very briefly taken command of a few months back was gone, destroyed thanks to a madman. The ship on its way was a rechristened Galaxy-class vessel that Mackenzie Calhoun took command of in the wake of his return from the “dead.” Picard was there for the christening, and had regaled his crew with the story of how he was ready to make Elizabeth Shelby the captain just as Calhoun turned up. He wound up with the ship; Picard wound up performing the wedding ceremony between the two. Shelby got command of the Trident, an Ambassador-class vessel.
Shelby irritated the first officer, mostly because of her strident attitude, but deep down he suspected they were more alike than not and that was where the problem lay. A key difference between them was her ambition, and he presumed she should be somewhat mellowed now that she had both Calhoun and a ship of her own.
Still, the reports from Starfleet were disturbing, since they indicated that both ships were involved in trying to settle a gateway-inspired war between the Aerons and the Markanians. Somehow, this led both Captains Shelby and Calhoun to enter a gateway and were now presumed missing. If they were not recovered, it would be a tremendous loss.
” Trident to Enteprise. “
Riker looked up and saw an attractive woman with dark blond hair tied in a knot at the top of her head, cobalt-blue eyes, and an intriguing scar on her left cheek. This was Kat Mueller, who had been the night-shift commander on the previous Excalibur. “Riker here.”
“Commander Mueller, in temporary command of the Trident. “
“So I understand. Sorry to hear about Captain Shelby. She was a fine officer.” “I would disagree,” Mueller said, a hint of humor in her eye.
“I’m sorry?”
“She is a fine officer and will be rejoining us just as soon as we complete this assignment.”
Riker smiled at that and added, “Well, that’s good news. Calhoun as well?”
“The man cheats death more often than anyone in the Fleet.” Riker was growing to like this woman by the moment. He hadn’t gotten to know her very well during his brief tenure on the Excalibur.
“I’ll take that as a yes. We won’t have a lot of time so we’re hoping to beam the Resonator en route.”
“Beam a single object as we pass one another at high warp? That’s imaginative.”
“Born out of desperation, I admit,” he said.
“Very well, we trust you will get it right the first time.”
“Well, there’s no time for a second attempt if we’re to repeat this with Excalibur.”
As expected, the highly trained staff of the Enterprise managed the feat with minimal fuss and the two ships sped off toward different stars.