The Farther Shore - Christie Golden [63]
“My thoughts exactly,” came a cool female voice. Watson whirled, his hand going his phaser. “Don’t draw it, Commander, or I’ll drop you where you stand.”
Watson, Hughes, and Whitman stood and stared at the four figures in the doorway. Three of them had phasers. Janeway’s was trained on Watson, and the other two had Hughes and Whitman in their sights.
“You’re good, Admiral,” said Watson, admiration creeping into his voice as he lifted his hands. Whitman and Hughes emulated him. “I should have acted sooner. I knew something was wrong. But at the risk of sounding like an old-fashioned hero from one of Lieutenant Roske’s holodeck programs, you won’t get away with this.”
“No one is a villain here, Commander,” Janeway said. “We’re all on the same side.”
[187] “Then why do three of us have phasers trained on the rest of us?” Watson asked.
“No time to sit down over a nice cup of coffee and straighten things out. I regret that we’re going to have to put you and your crew in the brig for a few hours.”
When they didn’t move, the Vulcan spoke up. “The admiral’s words were not a request, gentlemen.”
As he passed her, Watson turned to Janeway and said with narrowed eyes, “I might be looking at the inside of a Starfleet brig for a few hours, Admiral. You’ll be looking at it for the rest of your life.”
She didn’t rise to the bait. Her eyes were, oddly, soft and compassionate as she replied, “If we’re not all assimilated, then you can bet that I’ll be happy to stare at brig walls until the day I die, Commander. Let’s go.”
Harry looked up in surprise when the door hissed open. “Admiral on deck!” he said, and snapped to attention. Crais leaped out of the captain’s chair as if it were white hot and stood at attention as well. His face was red.
“Admiral Janeway,” he said, striving to retain his composure. “What an unexpected honor. Commander Watson failed to alert me that you would be visiting the bridge.”
Smiling pleasantly, Janeway pulled the phaser from behind her back and pointed it directly at Crais.
“I’m afraid that Commander Watson is no longer in a position to alert you to anything, Lieutenant. We’re going to have to ask you to join him in the brig while we finish up here.”
Crais continued to gape, but moved slowly toward the turbolift. Chakotay pointed his phaser at him and silently encouraged him to move faster.
[188] “Looks like you guys have gotten everything well in hand, Admiral,” said Kim. He supposed that knowing Janeway as well as he did, he ought not to have been quite so surprised. But Watson had struck him as a challenge.
Janeway smiled. “We’ve taken the ship, Harry. Everyone but our people is in the brig under Tuvok’s watchful eye. Were you able to stop Watson’s message from getting out a few moments ago?”
“Only just,” confessed Harry. “The consoles are so torn apart that I’ve really had my hands full up here.”
“It should be a little easier now that you don’t have to worry about anyone else trying to send out a message. I want you to put up some kind of screen, so that if anyone does try to contact us they’ll get a false sense that all is normal, if troubled by a few glitches.”
Harry’s mind began sifting through various options. “I’ll do my best, Admiral.”
“If there are any problems, you can now contact me freely,” she said, touching his comm badge with a forefinger. “We’ll all be in sickbay, including Icheb and Seven.”
“They’re out of the chamber so soon?”
“I’m afraid so. Kaz, the Doctor and Data can’t make any further progress without the input of someone who’s more familiar with the Borg. Kaz tells me that even the little regeneration time they had helped. Who knows,” she said, somberly, “soon we may all be able to get all the regeneration time we need.”
As she left, Kim crawled back under the console and tried to think if he could somehow hook up a holographic display in case someone needed to talk to Watson.
[189] He had completely forgotten about the message he had downloaded into the buffer.
“How are you feeling, Your Majesty?”
Covington blinked. “Well,”