The Red King - Michael A. Martin [117]
Damn! Riker thought, gripping the armrests of his command chair nearly hard enough to snap them off entirely. “How bad is the damage?”
Jaza remained intent on his console and the readouts that were quickly scrolling there. “The good news is that the outgassing is falling off quickly. I’d estimate from the volume of atmosphere vented that only one pressurized section has been compromised. They were fortunate.”
Except for the people who happened to be in that section, Riker thought. “Can the people in that section be beamed out?”
“Not without lowering our shields,” Jaza said, sounding stricken. “We can’t do that, and neither can any of the other ships in the convoy. Even if there were enough time, and if there weren’t so much refractory metal in the asteroid’s crust…” He trailed off, his meaning plain. Although there had been some documented cases of Neyel surviving for prolonged periods in a hard vacuum, everyone in the space-exposed section was sure to die.
Riker nodded slowly. “How many casualties?”
“It’s hard to say for certain, sir,” Dakal said, facing Riker from the forward ops station. “Upwards of ten thousand, I would estimate.”
Riker’s shoulders sagged as though he’d been dealt a physical blow. He tried not to picture the faces of the children, the elderly, the helpless. Not to mention Vale, Keru, Tuvok, Mekrikuk, and the medical and security teams still working among the Vanguard refugees.
The bridge shook and rattled as though Titan had come under attack. Riker spun his chair back in Jaza’s direction. “Titan has just crossed the phenomenon’s event horizon, Captain,” said Ensign Lavena, her gloved, webbed fingers entering commands into her console at a rapid clip.
“Shield status?” Riker asked.
“Shields at ninety-four percent and holding,” said Dakal. He sounded intensely relieved that the passage home was so much smoother than Titan’s accidental arrival in the Small Magellanic Cloud had been. At least so far.
“Convoy status?”
Dakal touched one of the control surfaces before him, bringing a tactical diagram up on the main viewscreen. A congeries of blips dutifully appeared, representing Vanguard and the Romulan fleet. The convoy blips were towing the Vanguard blip through a wireframe representation of the Red King and the interspatial corridor that ran directly through its heart. A large white icon that represented Titan was taking the point, leading the way for the entire procession.
“Everything seems to be going according to plan, Captain,” Lavena said unnecessarily.
“Sensor web remains fully operational,” Dakal reported. “All navigational hazard telemetry links show green as well.”
“At least the Vanguard habitat doesn’t seem to be taking any further hits,” Jaza said. “Probably because we’re approaching the midpoint of the spatial rift.”
The eye of the storm, Riker thought. He fervently hoped they wouldn’t encounter still more trouble once they reached the other side, where Romulan space presumably awaited them.
“Crossing the midpoint…now,” Lavena said.
“The Valdore is signaling, Captain,” said Dakal. “Twenty-nine of her ships have just jettisoned their warp cores, per our simulations. The crippled vessels are riding their own collapsing warp bubbles to the other side.”
Feeling a sensation of pins and needles in both his hands, Riker realized that he was once again gripping his chair arms far too hard. He released them with a conscious effort.
“Brace yourselves,” Jaza said. “The subspace shock wave should reach us in thirty-one seconds.”
Riker touched his combadge again. “Riker to Ra-Havreii.”
“Engineering. Ra-Havreii here.”
“This is the part where you earn your combat pay, Commander. The shields are your highest priority.”
“We’re ready for anything, Captain,” said the chief engineer, though the tremulous undertone in his voice didn’t inspire a great deal of confidence. Don’t fold up on me now, Doctor, Riker thought.
“Something’s wrong,” Jaza said sharply.
Of course, Riker thought, rising from his chair and crossing to the railing that ran alongside the main science station. “What’s the