Lost Era 05_ Deny thy Father - Jeff Mariotte [122]
Will looked around, orienting himself. “I think so.”
“Good. You know where the mess hall is, or you can eat replicator food in your quarters. I was you, I’d go to the mess hall so you can meet some more folks and start learning names. Show up on time for duty tomorrow-if there’s one thing Captain Pressman hates, it’s lateness. Watch out for Shinnareth Bestor. She’s the operations officer. Good at her job, but with a foul temper, especially in the mornings. She’s become addicted to coffee, I think.”
Will tried to absorb all this. “Any other advice?”
“Don’t run into anything. Don’t break the ship. You’ll be fine.” He turned and started to leave, but then stopped after a few steps and looked back over his shoulder. “And when you start having to shave every day, be sure you do. The captain also hates unkempt officers on his bridge.”
Then Marc was gone, and Will was, for the first time, really alone on his new ship. His new home. It was big and strange and he knew virtually no one, and first thing in the morning strangers would be depending on his ability to do his job.
But if there was one thing Will was confident about, it was that. He knew he could do the job.
Chapter 31
“I’ve known you a long time, Owen,” Kyle said. “You’ve always been straight with me. That’s why I’ve come to you now. No matter what’s going on, I can’t believe you’re involved.”
Owen Paris looked at Kyle, his mouth still agape, eyes wide, and shook his head slowly. “You can’t believe?” he replied. “I can’t believe you’re standing there. It’s been two years, hasn’t it?”
“A little more,” Kyle admitted. “I’m sorry I didn’t say anything before, Owen. I didn’t know who to trust. I was scared. Not in my right mind, I guess.”
Owen turned his gaze toward the top of his desk. “I thought you were dead, Kyle. I think after a while, we all did.”
“Not an entirely inappropriate conclusion, considering someone was trying awfully hard to kill me.”
“So it seemed,” Owen said. “And then you vanished. What else were we to think? We tried to find you-Starfleet Security was knocking on doors and interviewing people all over the place. But you were simply gone. Where were you? Where have you been all this time?”
“That’s not important now, Owen. It was a bad place, and I lost someone I cared about there. Tell you the truth, I’m still grieving for her. But I’m back now, and I want to get to the bottom of this thing once and for all. I don’t want to be looking over my shoulder for the rest of my life, wondering who the next killer is. And I’d like for the rest of my life to last more than just a few days.”
“We all would,” Owen assured him. “I know Starfleet investigated the attempts on your life, the ones we knew about, anyway, for a while. But they didn’t turn anything up, and then you were gone, so I think the investigation petered out after a while. No body, no evidence, no witnesses. It’s still an open file, I’m sure, but with nothing to go on, they had to give up the hunt at some point.”
Kyle had contacted Owen’s office shortly after landing in San Francisco. He’d been nervous about approaching Starfleet Command, and after trying to think of a safe way to approach, had finally sent a message to Owen asking him to meet at the wharf. Kyle had arrived a little early, and the ten minutes or so he’d had to wait for Owen to show up had been anxious ones-hoping Owen, and he alone, had received the message and would comply. Now they stood on the wharf in gathering fog, looking out at the choppy gray water. “So if they’d like to get busy again, they’re welcome to. As for evidence, I don’t have any more than I did then. But now that I’ve returned, if the attempts start up again there’ll be plenty, I imagine.”
“If the attempts start up again after this long, it means someone really holds a grudge,” Owen said. “You still don’t have any idea who it might be?”
“Not a clue,” Kyle informed him. “Or rather, too many ideas. Anyone in my position has a lot of