The Sky's the Limit - Marco Palmieri [138]
“I don’t know,” Picard replied. “It seems to be biometrically encoded so that only your mother can unlock it, and he left instructions to deliver it in strict confidentiality. But even so, I never felt that it was my place to view it.”
The girl approached them, her eyes focused upon the curious gadget. Slipping into the open chair at the end of the table, she reached out for it.
“Tiaru!” her mother chastised her. “You don’t know how to operate it. Leave it alone.”
Tiaru retracted her arms but appeared unfazed by her mother’s reproach. She looked up at Picard. “Captain, sir?” she said. “Do you believe my father betrayed the empire?”
Picard froze. In his mind, he heard the voice of Admiral Jarok in the captain’s ready room eight years earlier: She will grow up believing her father was a traitor. How was he to answer? The question was difficult enough without having to gain the understanding of a child.
Thankfully, Ai’lara intervened. “That is enough,” she said sternly. “Return to your room at once.”
“I’m sorry, Mother, but I cannot,” the girl boldly replied. “I must hear the captain’s answer.”
Inwardly, Picard winced at the girl’s dogged persistence. Outwardly, he folded his hands and tilted his head toward her. “Tiaru,” he said, hoping not to sound patronizing. “Your father was faced with a very difficult decision. But in the end, I believe he did what he felt in his heart was the right thing.”
“Wonderful,” Ai’lara said, rolling her eyes. “An answer grounded in safe human moral relativism.”
The hint of a scowl creased Picard’s brow. “Do you believe humans are immoral?”
“The need for a stable and honorable society dictates morality!” Ai’lara said, raising her voice. “Your human culture promotes anarchy over security. Do you honestly believe that an empire can survive if every leader is free to follow his own fallible conscience?”
Picard tilted up his chin ever so slightly. “Perhaps it is the strength of our ‘human’ conscience that enables us to survive.”
Ai’lara lifted her cup and rose from the table. “Well then…I trust Alidar was right at home aboard your ship.” She walked back toward the replicator.
“On the contrary,” Picard said. “His own home was nearly all he would speak of.”
Ai’lara tossed the cup into the recycling unit with a loud crash and remained there, with her back turned toward her guest. “He should have thought of that before he left us.”
Picard thought he could detect the faintest crack in her voice. Hoping to defuse a volatile situation, he softened his tone. “Obviously this is not just about your husband’s loyalties to the empire,” he said gently. “You’ve been abandoned—left alone to raise a daughter.”
His words seemed to pierce her chest as she momentarily stiffened, then slumped forward. She glanced over at Tiaru, still seated and watching the exchange with wide-eyed fascination, and the anger in the woman’s eyes dissolved into mere melancholy. “My daughter,” she said. “She is the end of a tainted family line. No man will take a wife whose honor has been shattered.”
“I don’t need a mate,” the girl stated confidently.
“One day you will wish to begin a family,” her mother insisted, returning to the table to stand beside her daughter. “But we are without mnhei’sahe—we have no honor.”
“You don’t know my wishes!” the girl nearly shouted. “We don’t ever talk about them. We never speak of any of this! He was my father…and you won’t tell me anything about him.”
Ai’lara opened her mouth to respond, but no sound came forth. Her face no longer conveyed any emotion but pain.
“I know about honor,” Tiaru continued. “The youth institute taught us that if you remain true to yourself, no one can take your honor from you!”
“Oh, Tiaru…,” Ai’lara whispered. She reached out and ran her fingers through her daughter’s hair.
Now distinctly uncomfortable, Picard cleared his throat. “I believe I should let myself out.”
“No,” Ai’lara said with sudden assertiveness. “You must tell me why.”
“I beg your pardon?” Picard replied.
She reached for the padd on the table. “Why he