Relics - Michael Jan Friedman [48]
Kane’s mouth twisted then and he reached out to grab Sousa’s tunic. But Sousa was too fast for him; he grabbed Kane’s wrist instead.
And it might have gone farther than that, except there was a crowd of crew members around them before he knew it, and some of them were driving a wedge between him and Kane. They glared at each other across the wedge, too, as if they still wanted to go at it. But it was over.
“Come on,” someone whispered in Sousa’s ear. “Walk away, man, walk away-before this goes on somebody’s record.”
Sousa walked away. Not immediately, of course. He was too angry for that. But before he knew it, he was being ushered to the table where he’d seen Tranh and the others. Someone brought him something to drink.
And by the time he thought to look for Kane again, the man was gone.
Geordi was impressed. He’d only completed that spectrographic analysis the night before. The captain could hardly have had time to study it in depth, much less call his chief engineer to his ready room for a discussion of it.
But call he had. And when Captain Picard called, you didn’t ask questions. You just did what you were told.
Before Geordi knew it, the turbolift doors were parting in front of him, revealing the ordered symmetry of the Enterprise’s main bridge. Riker and Troi were in their customary places on either side of the command center, but the center seat was empty. Worf, who was manning the Tactical station as usual, gave him a quick glance as he emerged from the lift.
The Klingon’s dark eyes inquired as to the reason for his presence here. At a loss, Geordi shrugged. No doubt, he would know more by the time he passed Worf on his way out.
Crossing to the ready room door, the engineer stood in front of it. He thought he heard the chimes that told the captain someone was waiting to see him, though it was probably his imagination. After all, the room was designed for privacy.
A moment later, the door panel slid aside and Geordi found himself peering across the intervening space at Captain Picard. The captain turned away from his monitor and indicated the chair on the other side of his desk.
“Please,” he said. “Have a seat, Mr. La Forge.”
Geordi went inside, hearing the door shoosh closed behind him. Taking the proferred chair, he said “Sir?”
Picard leaned back in his own ch air, planted his elbows on his armrests and made a steeple of his fingers. Right away, Geordi knew this wasn’t about any analysis, spectrographic or otherwise. This was about one of those touchy subjects the captain preferred to discuss face to face.
“I have been thinking about our approach to investigating the Jenolen,” Picard said at last. “I understand that her crew conducted an extensive survey of the Dyson Sphere before it crashed.”
Geordi nodded. “That’s true, sir.”
“Have we been able to access those records?”
The engineer shrugged his shoulders. “We tried to download the memory core, but it was pretty heavily damaged in the crash. We haven’t been able to get much out of it, so far.”
“I see,” said Picard. And then “Perhaps Captain Scott could be of use in accessing that material.”
Captain … Scott? Why hadn’t he thought of that before? It would have given the man something better to do than clog up the works in engineering.
“It’s possible,” said Geordi. “He would know those systems better than any of us.” He reviewed a mental list of everyone in his section that was on duty. “I’ll have Lieutenant Bartel beam down with him,” he decided. “They can get to work on the memory core together.”
Was that it? Had Geordi misread the captain’s intention to discuss something sensitive? Or was there still something that hadn’t come out yet?
“Will that be all, sir?” he prodded.
Picard fixed him with his gaze. “No, Mr. La Forge.” A pause. “To be blunt, I would like you to accompany Mister Scott.”
Geordi’s first reaction was one of surprise. “Me, sir?”
And then he realized what this was about. The captain must have gotten wind of their little tete-a-tete in engineering, and wanted to give Geordi a chance to patch things up.
Picard leaned forward.