Resistance - J.M. Dillard [68]
“She could not be helped,” T’Lana answered, her voice tight, controlled. She had worked through the memory many times, she reminded herself; it no longer troubled her. The past was simply the past. Wozniak was gone and no longer suffered. “I could not tell whether she was alive or dead. Her injuries were too grievous. She certainly would not have survived being taken to sickbay.”
“But you would have saved her life if you had been able.”
“Of course.”
“Does logic always override loyalty?”
T’Lana did not answer immediately, and the Klingon took advantage of her silence.
“You were loyal to your captain,” Worf said. “That is something I respect. And I am loyal to mine—even though I am refusing to obey his last command to me. I will not leave and allow him to cause irreparable harm to Starfleet. He has suffered this dishonor once before. I will accomplish his goal: to stop the Borg.” He paused. “In order to achieve what is best for the captain, and for the crew, I must disobey him. But emotion does not always have to be separate from logic. Ensign Allen is, right now, contacting Admiral Janeway so I may discuss the situation. If we fail, Starfleet needs to be prepared. At the same time, I need her permission for something as well. However, I should warn you that if she does not grant me that permission, we will be going back anyway. Because if we do not stop the Borg here and now, millions will die.” A faint ripple of emotion—grief? T’Lana wondered—crossed his features. “Do you understand, Counselor? We have the opportunity to save millions. If this crew must die in order to do so, then we will do so willingly.
“I do this for the good of the many, not for the few or the one,” Worf continued, with unaffected eloquence. “Is that not logical?”
T’Lana stared at him a long moment. She thought she had understood the Klingon; now she saw that her opinion of him had been one-sided and simplistic. She had failed to realize the depth of his intelligence or his wisdom. She opened her mouth to say, Perhaps it is. But a voice filtering through the ready room interrupted her.
“Crusher to Worf…”
Worf answered the signal. “One moment, Doctor.” He glanced down at T’Lana. His defensiveness was entirely gone. His manner was solicitous, even gentle. “Did you have anything further to say, Counselor?”
She shook her head and answered just as gently, “No, sir.”
“Dismissed.”
Worf sat heavily at the captain’s ready room desk. Confessing his feelings had been painful, but he felt that T’Lana had deserved the truth. He admired her for confronting him—he had expected no less of her—and for stating her opinion forcefully. She was very different from any other Vulcan he had met.
After he had explained his reasoning, he could not read her expression—it was too subtle for human, much less Klingon, eyes—but she seemed to have finally understood his decision.
At any rate, there was no time to argue with her any further on the subject.
He addressed the invisible Beverly Crusher. “Yes, Doctor?”
Her voice was filled with the exhilaration of discovery. “Worf, remember you said that I should ask for whatever I needed to complete my research on the Borg?”
“Yes…”
“Well,” the doctor said exultantly, “I need you.”
Worf frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“I mentioned the feminizing hormone that can transform a Borg drone into a queen…The human analogue would be estrogen. It’s so simple, I should have seen it immediately—the antidote is an androgenic compound.”
“A what compound?” The term sounded vaguely familiar, but he could not place it.
“Androgenic. Androgen is the human male hormone. Klingon males have a very similar one that produces masculine sexual characteristics; in fact, they have the most potent form around. If I could have a blood sample from you, I know I could develop something fast acting that would neutralize the queen immediately.”
Worf hesitated. In the interest of saving time, it was simplest to kill the Borg queen with conventional weapons. But he