Section 31_ Rogue - Andy Mangels [97]
“Captain, do I have to remind you what happened at the Lenarian conference?” Crusher said, beginning to sound impatient.
He remembered all too well; the Lenarians had shut his heart down with a compressed tetryon beam. That incident had nearly cost him his life. But Picard knew that the stray tetryon output from any number of cloaking devices was a far cry from a weapon of that sort.
“Doctor, if you believe that I’m endangering my life unnecessarily, then I suggest you relieve me of duty.”
“I wish I could. No one really knows for certain what the conditions will be like inside the cloaking field. But you need to know the risks.”
Picard had never enjoyed being reminded that he owed his life to an artificial heart, and that was especially true now that Batanides and Zweller had come back into his life. After all, the only reason he now needed the synthetic organ was because the three of them had once lacked the simple common sense to demur from a fight against three bloodthirsty Nausicaans.
Picard spoke into his combadge, his manner somewhat gentler. “Objection noted. And if it’s any consolation, Doctor, we won’t need to stay behind the barrier for more than a few minutes at the most. Picard out.”
Hawk quietly cleared his throat. “Everything’s green to go, Captain.”
“Then, I trust that means you’ve put your misgivings aside?”
“Truthfully?” Hawk said. “Not entirely. It still strikes me as a horrible waste. But we don’t have a better option.”
Picard appreciated Hawk’s candor. “Then let’s get under way,” he said as he took control of the helm.
“Cloaking system still functioning properly,” Hawk said, looking up from one of his indicator panels. No one would be able to observe the scoutship’s departure from the Enterprise.
Picard brought the scoutship smoothly forward, guided her through the wide launch bay, and departed for the inky blackness beyond. The viewer now showed the livid red-and-ocher daylight side of Chiaros IV.
Seeing that their heading was already laid in, Picard instructed Hawk to engage the impulse engines at warp point-two. Crossing the approximately five AUs that separated Chiaros IV from the subspace singularity’s cloaking field would be slow going at that speed-the journey would take about three hours-but pushing the scoutship’s engines any harder would risk drawing unwanted Romulan attention. Even at this velocity, they would still reach the cloaking field a few minutes before the Enterprise’s departure deadline. And a few minutes ought to be all the time Data would require.
Hawk acknowledged Picard’s order and adjusted the forward velocity to twenty percent that of light. Chiaros IV quickly turned away into the darkness and fell away into the infinite night of the Geminus Gulf. The commandeered vessel dove outward beneath the ecliptic, arcing headlong toward the singularity.
“Your captain’s beverage is delightful,” Grelun said to Riker and Troi. “The human Urlgray who devised it must surely be a god among men.”
Sipping from a mug that looked absurdly tiny in his enormous hand, the Chiarosan sat shirtless at the edge of a bed that seemed scarcely capable of supporting his weight. Now that Will Riker was in close quarters with Grelun, he noticed that the rebel leader smelled faintly of freshly turned earth and lilacs. The aroma, as well as Grelun’s fierce mien, reminded him absurdly of Worf.
But what struck Riker most was Grelun’s astonishing recuperative powers. Less than three days after he had regained consciousness-and had refused further dermal regeneration treatments-Grelun’s body bore not a trace of the severe disruptor burns he had sustained during the battle in the rebel compound. Even the coarse brown hair on his thick-thewed arms had grown back almost completely.
Riker was just as impressed by the huge Chiarosan’s quiet dignity, as well as by the extreme delicacy with which he held his drinking vessel. Surely, he could have smashed it with a mere twitch of his fingers.
“I must thank you again for the hospitality that you and your captain have shown