Resistance - J.M. Dillard [14]
T’Lana had been favorably impressed by Captain Picard’s presence the first few moments after meeting him. She had expected him to be much more choleric in nature, given his history of relying heavily on emotion and intuition—as well as the fact that he had, in the past, brazenly ignored direct orders from Starfleet Command. Instead, he seemed extraordinarily self-possessed for a human.
But his strange behavior on the turbolift and on the bridge had concerned T’Lana. Admittedly, she was disturbed by the fact that Commander Worf was now in command of the ship. While Captain Picard’s reliance on emotion had proved effective, Commander Worf’s had not.
She was displeased with herself, however, for her behavior toward the Klingon; she should have greeted him as cordially as she had the others. She knew that the shifts in her behavior would be barely perceptible to most humans. But it was clear that, at the very least, the captain and chief medical officer had noticed something amiss. At the same time, altering her behavior would have been dishonest; her disapproval of Worf was solidly based in fact. And honesty, to Vulcans, was more important than manners. Even after serving for more than twenty years on Starfleet vessels, she was still more Vulcan than Starfleet.
T’Lana had to admit to herself that Worf’s personal presence had not been what she had anticipated. She had expected to find the most Klingon of Klingons, one who emanated ferocity, instability, ill temper. Given her exceptional telepathic abilities, she had expected to sense the proximity of a disordered, chaotic mind.
She had found none of that. She had sensed a proud Klingon, yes, but also a disciplined officer, not a warrior, who had looked on her with respect and admiration. He possessed a trait unrevealed by the holographs in his Starfleet file, an attractive, intangible quality that had no counterpart in the Vulcan language but that humans referred to as charisma. And T’Lana had been astonished to find that her first instinct was to respond favorably to him…with interest.
Then memory had returned to her and left her unable to respond courteously to him.
Even so, she felt she had made the best possible decision, for the good of the service, by requesting a transfer to the Enterprise. If Captain Picard was in fact incapacitated, Worf would assume permanent command—a situation that could easily bring about disaster. The Enterprise had already come close enough to it before, courtesy of irrational command decisions. Her logical input as a counselor would be desperately required.
And T’Lana knew all too well what it was like to stand on the bridge of a starship blasted apart and ultimately destroyed, all for the sake of emotion.
Beverly reacted as Picard had anticipated: with a bright flash of fear, which she quickly dismissed and replaced with a healthy medical skepticism. His intimate friend and lover was gone, and his chief medical officer stood in her place. He would have expected no less of her. At the same time, he felt a very personal regret for what he had had to tell her, for what she would no doubt discover to be the truth.
“I realize you’re convinced of this,” she said carefully, “but I’m sure you understand that I can’t rule out a physical or emotional component until I’ve had a chance to examine you.”
“Of course.” He hoped desperately that the whispers in his head were the result of illness; at the same time, he knew—with the certainty of the Collective to which he had once belonged—that they were not. Without being asked, he swung his legs onto the diagnostic bed and lay back.
As she began to run the scans, he sighed and closed his eyes, grateful for the silence, however temporary, in his skull. On the bridge, the Borg chatter had grown so thunderous that he had buckled beneath it. Words that had previously been inaudible whispers had roared in his consciousness: Alpha…launch ship…attack.
He had sensed anger beneath the words—or perhaps not anger, since Borg drones were incapable of