Survivors - Jean Lorrah [83]
“We must surprise her,” Rikan agreed. “The plan to substitute something harmless for the Riatine seems best, if we can implement it.”
“That’s what you’re paying us for,” Dare replied. “Data, have you any records beyond the routes from the manufacturing plants to the water purification plants?”
Yar saw Data’s head lift in the half-nod that said he did indeed. “I have the time schedules, including places where the drivers are exchanged, and where they stop for meals and fuel along the way. However … ” he stared at nothing as he cross-referenced, ” … possibly unbeknownst to the drivers, they are tracked by Nalavia’s army units.”
Unbeknownst? Yar was amused to hear Data doing his chameleon act, picking up the flavor of Dare’s speech patterns.
“Tracked?” Dare asked. “How?”
“There are tracing devices in the trucks, by which a small armed escort makes certain the vehicles follow the route and schedule. Where there are no parallel roads, the escort follows at a discreet distance, or else flyers are used. The patterns vary-” The android frowned in momentary puzzlement. “Ah, I see why. They travel through the open countryside, where undrugged citizens might wonder at a military escort for what is purported to be water purifier. Therefore the method of escort changes frequently, parallel, following, preceding, troop carriers, single-person vehicles, flyers-apparently Nalavia hopes no pattern will be noticed.”
“It works,” said Aurora. “We’ve heard no suspicions. But now that we know-“
“I have the schedules for the next four days,” said Data. “There was nothing beyond that in Nalavia’s computer.”
Dare grinned at him, no sarcasm this time. “That’s enough-give us those schedules, and we’ll figure out how to manage a substitution. Mr. Data, how would you fancy leaving Starfleet for a life of danger and excitement on the outer edge of the galaxy?”
Yar knew it was said jokingly, but Data replied solemnly, “I am afraid I would not … fancy it at all.”
One of the advantages of being an android was the ability to keep several ideas in one’s consciousness at once, and many others within ready access. Data found in the next few hours that it was also a disadvantage.
Tasha seemed caught up in the hope of freeing Treva’s city dwellers from the hypnotic chemical, forgetting that, even though they had a sort of trustee status, she and Data were prisoners here. Data could not forget who Darryl Adin really was, and that produced another, unanticipated, problem: he liked the man.
Adin was the glue that bound his small coterie together, just as Jean-Luc Picard was for the crew of the Enterprise. Adin’s role was more difficult than Picard’s. Although his followers were few, they were even more diverse than the motley bridge crew Data served among, for they had no common loyalty to an ideal, such as Starfleet, to hold them together. In the course of that first day, Data heard them squabble interminably, but saw them work toward a common goal.
And through it all, nothing Adin did suggested that Data was less than a person. Only Geordi LaForge, of all the people Data knew, had accepted him so unquestioningly upon first acquaintance.
No, he suddenly realized, the warlord had done exactly the same thing. But Data had little contact with Rikan that day, while he and Adin worked side by side for hours.
Before time for dinner, they had a plan. Sdan and Poet left with some of Rikan’s people to borrow vehicles from heavy transport companies in Rikan’s territory. Barb and the Tellarites went off with a “shopping list” for containers, paint, and stencils. Jevsithian had long since left them, while others had drifted in and out all day. Now Aurora joined Data at the computer, along with Pris Shenkley, the weapons designer, to go over the plan step by step for possible hazards.
Data could not help being aware when Adin and Tasha stopped participating, and then quietly left the strategy room together.
But he saw them again at dinner, his first meal since yesterday’s