Immortal Coil - Jeffrey Lang [98]
Data did not reply immediately. He did not wish to add to her burden, but could not resist the need to speak his mind. “I need you, too.”
She looked back into his face and her eyes glowed with affection and regret. “I know,” she said. “But not as much as he does.”
And then, Data had an insight. Before he even knew why, he asked, “Rhea … what do you need?”
Her head jerked then like someone had just poked her between the ribs and stared at Data openmouthed for the count of three. “What do I—?” she began to ask, but before she could speak another word, Rhea was cut off by the sharp clang of a klaxon. Rhea flinched, stuck her fingers in her ears and waited several seconds for the alarm to shut off. When it did not, she grabbed Data’s hand and led him to the exit.
The klaxon was not quite so deafening outside the performance hall, but Data put off asking any questions. It did not require intuition to see that something was wrong and Rhea was obviously leading them to someplace where they could do something about the situation. They went down the spiral stairway, out into the hall, through the section Data had visited, then out the other side. Soon, they left behind the artwork and carpeted floors and entered the station’s gray-walled nerve center.
Vaslovik stood in the center of the giant, circular room. As soon as Data and Rhea entered, the klaxon shut off and Data saw an exocomp flutter away into the dark upper recesses of the chamber. He wondered if the exocomps were nervous around anyone other than Vaslovik, or if maintaining the station required constant activity on their part.
Vaslovik was studying a huge holographic tactical display of the star system, the station a red circle at its center. To his left was a two-dee schematic of the station, which was undergoing a subtle change in configuration as weapons and defensive mechanisms began to sprout from ports. To the right was a smaller holotank, one which Vaslovik was ignoring for the moment. Data studied it for several milliseconds before he recognized it for what it was: a political map of the quadrant. Data watched facts and figures crawl up and spiral through the displays: population studies, movements of Starfleet and other military forces, and detailed readouts of spatial phenomena—a continuous galactic “weather” report, culled from who knew how many sources to which Vaslovik had gained access?
But before he could ponder these questions any further, Data’s attention was drawn by events unfolding on the tactical display. A red streak of light crossed a perimeter line and closed with the station’s lower hemisphere. Small yellow dots flew out from weapons ports—torpedoes or some kind of antimissile device—but nothing impeded the red streak’s passage. Seconds before it struck, Data grabbed the edge of the nearest console and was alarmed to see that neither Rhea nor Vaslovik did the same.
The red streak flared against the underside of the station schematic and damage control figures scrolled down the screen, but the deck did not rock. Data glanced at Rhea curiously. She looked back at him. “Good inertial dampeners,” she said. “Better than the ones you find on most starships, anyway.”
“Clearly,” Data acknowledged. “But can the station sustain another such explosion?”
“It had better,” Vaslovik said. “We’re being fired upon again.” In the holotank Data saw a tangle of red threads converging on the station. Data estimated a fleet of twenty ships, perhaps more.
“Do you have any countermeasures?” Data asked and began to study the consoles before him. Many of them were Federation issue, though several were much older than any of the interfaces he had ever used.
“Yes,” Vaslovik said, manipulating controls. Blue streaks blossomed and a constellation of yellow dots raced toward the red streaks, some of which flared and