Taking Wing - Michael A. Martin [114]
If not for my interference, Riker thought, beginning to wonder if the ambassador might not be right. But he took heart from the fact that Spock was no longer insisting that he be sent back to Xiomek now that the battle had been joined. Even the ambassador seemed to acknowledge that the solution to the current mess now had to come from one man: Captain William T. Riker.
Riker saw then that Vale was once again staring at the blank spot on the aft bulkhead. This time she was pointing toward it as well.
“I told you it was bad luck to leave Utopia Planitia without a dedication plaque,” she said, speaking quietly enough so that he doubted anyone else had heard her.
His brow furrowed involuntarily. “No, you didn’t.”
“Okay,” she whispered after a beat. “Then I should have.”
Except for the red-alert klaxons, silence reigned on the bridge. Every eye was on the viewscreen, where hell had begun to erupt in the skies over Ki Baratan. Riker was thankful, at least, that the convoy’s three aid ships had managed to get themselves out of harm’s way, at least for the moment.
“Incoming!” shouted Keru.
The bridge lights flickered as Titan shuddered from a sharp, forceful impact.
Commander Donatra’s bridge shook violently. Sparks and flame flashed across the oval-shaped chamber as yet another salvo of disruptor fire pummeled the Valdore. Ozone and smoke stung her nostrils as electrical fires tested the battered warbird’s fire-suppression system to its limits. Her right side ached as old wounds flared back to livid, angry life.
“Forward shields are failing, Commander,” cried Centurion T’Relek from the primary tactical station. Two decurions and an antecenturion were sprawled nearby on the deck, dead or dying.
Despite that, Donatra remained encouraged. They’re still merely trying to coerce us into backing off, she thought. They haven’t strafed the cities yet.
“Return fire, all tubes!” The bridge rumbled again from yet another direct hit. With shaking hands, the centurion launched another fusillade.
Donatra spun her chair toward the stoic young female decurion who was operating the communications console. “Have our reinforcements responded yet?”
The decurion shook her head gravely. “The Remans must be jamming us locally, Commander. I can’t even tell if our initial message got through to offworld elements of the fleet. Local units seem to be rallying, however.”
Donatra silently prayed that this would suffice to drive the Remans off, or at least dissuade them from trying to transform Ki Baratan into a charred crater.
Just before the Valdore’s recent communications difficulties began, Donatra had managed to intercept a fascinating subspace exchange between Xiomek and Captain Riker. She knew of the outrageous demand Xiomek had just made, as well as his threat to immolate the Romulan capital, as well as other cities, within four veraku should the Empire fail to accede. She had heard his threat to attack immediately should his own forces be assailed. She wondered if she could afford to take the colonel at his word.
It shouldn’t have made any difference either way. She was a Romulan military officer, and her world was in peril. Though she was badly outnumbered, she knew she should engage the enemy now. She wanted nothing more than to put a decisive end to the Reman threat, even if that meant risking everyone under her command, and courting the abrupt destruction of most of Ki Baratan.
But if there is to be any chance of our reinforcements arriving in time to overwhelm these wortu , Donatra thought, then I may have no choice but to find another way.
“Withdraw!” she shouted, despising herself. “Get our attack wing clear of jamming range as quickly as possible. We have to raise the reinforcement fleet immediately.”
The Valdore shuddered