Relics - Michael Jan Friedman [27]
The man didn’t linger any longer than he had to. A moment later, the doors slid closed behind him and Scott was alone.
Alone. In this gigantic suite. Aboard a vast and unfamiliar ship.
He sighed and sat down on the overstuffed couch they’d given him. He looked around. Then he sighed again. On the Enterprise-the one he’d cut his teeth on-the hum of the engines had been audible everywhere on the ship, no matter where you were. After a while, he’d had trouble sleeping anywhere else, because he missed that soothing hum.
He didn’t think he’d sleep well here. The place was as quiet as a tomb. Maybe there were engines humming somewhere on this ship, but you couldn’t prove it by his cabin. Nor, he suspected, anywhere else outside of engineering.
Scott suddenly felt very lost-like a child who’d strayed from his parents’ side. And he knew why, too. There was nothing for him to do here.
All his life, he had prided himself on his usefulness. If you wanted something done, you gave it to Scotty. People had called him a genius, a mechanical wizard, a bloody miracle worker.
The point was, he could make things happen. That is, if he was given a chance. And here … here and now… there was no chance.
This Enterprise had an engineer already. And even if it didn’t, he wouldn’t be nearly equal to the task-not with his incomplete and antiquated understanding of modern technology. Damn … he’d mistaken an EPS power tap for a data conduit. He could’ve gotten himself killed making a mistake like that.
Maybe if he’d had a family… if he’d settled down … he would’ve found some other way to define himself. But the only children he could ever rightly call his own were the engines of Jim Kirk’s Enterprise?-and those were long gone, like everything else he’d known and loved.
What to do Montgomery, what to do? Scott thought. Lord knew he had to do something or he’d go berserk. And he couldn’t believe that he alone had been preserved-out of all those poor souls on the Jenolen -just so he could slowly and painfully lose his marbles.
He perked up at the thought. He had been preserved, hadn’t he? And if that was the case, there had to be a purpose to it. Maybe it wasn’t apparent just yet, but a purpose nonetheless.
“Aye,” he said out loud. “Old Montgomery Scott is nae done yet. Somewhere out there in that great expanse of stars, maybe even somewhere on this ship, there’s a piece o’ machinery that needs my gentle touch. And if I’m patient, I’ll find it.”
Brave words, he thought. And even if he wasn’t quite sure he believed them, they sure sounded good.
Chapter Five
PICARD USED the back of his bare left hand to wipe away a rivulet of sweat that was threatening to run into his eyes. Then, with ease born of practice, he replaced his mask over his face and saluted his opponent with his blade.
A few meters away, Riker returned the salute and dropped into his crouch. Perhaps a bit too low, the captain judged. But then, his first officer was a comparative novice at the fine art of fencing.
“En garde,” Picard announced, taking a step forward.
Riker held his ground, not even moving his point. That took discipline, the captain knew. A rare quality in beginners.
Not that he had any intention of rewarding it. Taking another step, Picard lunged-not so much a serious attack as a means of getting his opponent to move backward, and thereby make him more vulnerable.
But Riker must have seen through his strategy, because he didn’t cooperate. Instead of retreating, he flipped the captain’s blade to the side-not much really, just enough to make it miss him-and launched a counterassault of his own.
It started out looking like a simple lunge, but it very quickly extended itself into a running attack. And it caught the more experienced man flatfooted. It was all Picard could do to swat at Riker’s point, keeping it from finding its target, as he back-pedaled the length of the fencing strip.
As the captain recreated beyond the end line, his adversary made one last, desperate thrust-and came up just short. Another inch and he’d have scored a touch. And a brilliant