Requiem - Michael Jan Friedman [40]
“This is the residence area, which you’ve already seen. In the lower levels, you’ll also find the outpost stores. If you need blankets, or clothes, or entertainment tapes, Lieutenant Harold or I can show you where to find them.”
Following the semicircle to its midpoint, they passed the life-support section and then came to two large globes supported on bases that were perhaps four meters high. “And these are our—” Santos began.
“Sensor relays,” Picard finished. “I’m familiar with the technology. I just never expected to see any this … closely.”
The doctor indicated a spot farther along the semicircle. “There’s the sensor analysis section. And farther down is the sciences area. You can see them up close tomorrow if you like. For now, I have just a few more things to show you before I have to reprimand myself for overexerting my patient.”
Santos gestured to two large buildings, situated more or less along an imaginary line that connected the two endpoints of the semicircle. “See those?” she asked. “One houses the administrative offices and the other is additional storage.”
Picard remembered that the “additional storage” structure was in fact the armory, though he understood why the doctor wouldn’t mention that. She described a third, lower building as “some engineering facility,” but he knew it was the fusion reactor that powered the station’s routine functions.
Then Santos pointed out the lowlying mountains, seen in the distance past the three buildings. “That is where you were found, about five hundred meters into those hills. Unfortunately, they’re unstable and prone to landslides, which is how you were hurt.”
The same hills, Picard mused, in which the Gorn had positioned themselves right before the appearance of Captain Kirk and his landing party. The invaders had been—or rather, would be—forced to retreat when Kirk fired a plasma grenade into the area. The captain supposed his missing communicator would be destroyed in the blast.
It was just as well. The communicator would have been useful to him if there were someone to receive the signal—but of course, there wasn’t. Picard might even have thought about trying to retrieve the device if there was any hope of using it as a marker for Commander Riker or a future Starfleet ship, but he knew it was useless. Though he always made it a point to keep his communicator fully energized, there was no chance of the charge lasting one hundred years.
“And now,” Santos resumed, “it’s just a short walk to our sensor array. That’s the main attraction around here.”
For a moment, Picard considered declining. He could use the time alone to make his final plans and perhaps collect what he needed from the kitchen. But he found it difficult to disappoint the doctor, to deny her the pleasure of sharing something she felt was important. Besides, he didn’t want to arouse suspicion in his only ally on the outpost.
“So where’s home for you, Mr. Hill?” Santos inquired, as they walked in between the sensor beacons and outside of the semicircle that defined the compound. “I mean, where were you from before you made space your home?”
“Is it that obvious?” the captain asked.
She nodded. “If you know what to look for. My father was a career merchant space traveler. He spent most of his life on freighters. Even when he was with you, it felt like he wasn’t. I see some of the same things in you, Mr. Hill. Sometimes, it seems you’re positively light-years away. However, unlike my father, you have the courtesy to at least respond to polite conversation.”
He chuckled. “You know me well already, Doctor.”
“Please call me Julia, Mr. Hill. Only the children and the newest batch of ensigns call me Doctor, and that’s just because I haven’t broken them in yet. And there’s the commodore as well, I suppose—but he’s in a class by himself.”
“You don’t like Commodore Travers,” Picard observed.
She shrugged. “To be perfectly blunt, I