The Children of Hamlin - Carmen Carter [58]
Or perhaps her betrayal of him had evened the score.
Settling down on a chair, Deelor let the rushing counterpoint of violins and violas sweep away the tensions born of his confrontation with the starship officers. If Ruthe held no grudge, neither would he.
Picard had stayed behind in the observation lounge after the other two men left. The view stretching outside the broad sweep of windows never bored him because the pattern of far-distant stars was always different, always changing. Those elusive beacons usually challenged and inspired him with their beauty, but just now the vista seemed bleak.
He heard the doors to the room slide open and thought for a second that Riker had returned, but the steps coming up behind him were too light to belong to his first officer. Then Picard caught Beverly Crusher’s reflection moving across the glass window. She stopped a few feet away from him and followed his gaze out into space. They stood side by side in silence for several minutes before she spoke.
“If you look at the stars for too long, you can start to feel like a god. Or to think you should be able to act like one. Omniscient, omnipotent, infallible.”
Picard did not respond.
“Captains and doctors are both prone to the syndrome. We expect to solve all problems and cure all ills, and then blame ourselves if we fail at impossible tasks. Or blame others.”
Picard finally glanced over at her. “Am I being lectured, Dr. Crusher?”
“Something like that.” Her eyes were still locked on the scene outside the ship. “I’m better at lectures than I am at apologies.”
“I don’t need either.”
“You deserve both.” Crusher took a deep breath and faced him squarely. “An apology for what I said to you in sickbay and a lecture for listening to me when I was in too foul a mood to make any sense.”
The captain’s stiff posture loosened. “I wasn’t in a particularly good humor myself,” said Picard wryly. “And you didn’t say anything that I hadn’t already told myself a hundred times over.”
“Which proves we both need a vacation.”
Picard smiled and the strain between them dissolved, only to be replaced by another, more familiar tension. Crusher took a step back and Picard looked out at the stars again. He wondered how he could have mistaken their brilliance for desolation.
“How is Lieutenant Yar doing?”
“Tearing apart my sickbay,” sighed Crusher. “I’ll release her soon, unless I strangle her first.”
“And Jason?”
“Sedated,” said Crusher tersely. “I’ve established his identity from the old Hamlin medical records. His DNA profile matches that of Jason Reardon. He was three years old at the time of his abduction, not much older than the child we recovered.”
“Are they related?”
“No,” she said. “However, I used genetic markers to trace the boy’s ancestry. His father was one of the original kidnapped group but his mother was apparently born in captivity, the result of a union between two maturing children.”
“A third-generation captive,” said the captain. His brows lifted in alarm.
“Yes, and he’s probably not the only one. Given their good health, the human population may be growing fairly quickly and spreading throughout the Choraii ships. How will we ever recover them all?”
“Is that even the right question?” asked the captain, recalling Andrew Deelor’s revelation of the high fatalities among the rescued captives.
Crusher raised her hand to stop him. “I’m not ready to deal with that issue yet. Oh, Jean-Luc, if you could have seen Jason when he beamed aboard … those terror-stricken eyes … ” She shook herself. “I’ve got to get back to sickbay. Jason’s sedative is due to wear off soon.”
They walked out of the lounge together but parted after crossing