War Stories (Book 2) - Keith R. A. DeCandido [13]
Here we go, Gold thought, forcing himself to sit up straight.
As the first exchange of phaser fire among the combatants began, Gold wondered how long this would go on. Over his five decades in Starfleet, he’d seen plenty of combat, but nothing like what he’d had to endure against the Dominion.
One of the Cardassian ships was trying to maneuver around toward the comm relay, but Appalachia cut them off, taking quite a few hits into the bargain.
Gold’s most fervent desire, of course, was to die in bed, surrounded by as many of his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren as were still alive and could fit in the room. However, he knew that such a fate was not terrifically likely—and had become somewhat less likely since the likes of the Borg and the Dominion came along, not to mention those skirmishes with the Klingons during the year and a half that the alliance with the Empire broke down. It was, in fact, during that eighteen-month period that Gold had seriously considered turning in his combadge for good. One of his oldest, dearest friends, Captain Mairin ni Bhroanin of the Starship Huygens, had been killed in action against the Klingons, and he told his wife, Rabbi Rachel Gilman, that he was considering retirement.
The Appalachia let loose with a phaser barrage on one of the Cardassian ships. “The Appalachia’s penetrated their shields,” McAllan reported. “Hull breach.”
Ina added, “Jem’Hadar moving in on Appalachia’s position.”
“C’mon, Ahmed, move your tuchis,” Gold muttered.
Ironically, given that she would be the greatest beneficiary of having her husband home on a permanent basis, it was Rachel who had talked him out of retiring. Probably, he thought ruefully, because she saw how miserable I was when I was assigned to Earth. After Gold’s first command, the Schiaparelli, was decommissioned, he requested an administrative post on Earth in order to be near his family. That lasted about six months.
“You belong in space,” Rachel had said at Mairin’s funeral.
“I belong with my family.”
“You’ll always belong with your family, but for now you also belong in space. Someday, it’ll just be the one. Then you come home.”
Ina interrupted Gold’s reverie. “One of the Cardassian ships is moving in on our position.”
“Steady, Wong,” Gold said. “Keep us between the Cardassians and the relay.”
Luckily, Gold’s continued ability to survive to retirement was aided by Starfleet’s decision to give the S.C.E. a better class of ship. For a long time, the S.C.E. had only the use of half-refitted decommissioned ships, held together with little more than selfsealing stembolts and happy thoughts. Later, they were given more current vessels, but still very much bottom-of-the-line. With Starfleet’s recent focus on ships better able to defend themselves, prompted by the Enterprise’s encounter with the Borg nine years earlier, Starfleet had set aside four of their newest ships—the Saber class, intended mainly as a small, maneuverable combat vessel—for the S.C.E.’s use, knowing that sometimes they would need to do more than just crawl around alien wrecks.
Like right now, Gold thought irritably as Cardassian phasers plowed into the da Vinci’s shields. “Return fire, full phasers!”
“Firing,” McAllan said.
“Ready quantum torpedoes, fire on my mark.”
Ina said, “Sloane firing on the Cardassians—they’re moving off.”
“Phaser fire ineffective,” McAllan said.
“Fire torpedoes.” Gold clenched his left hand.
“Firing.”
“Sloane is continuing to fire,” Ina added.
McAllan sounded a bit more triumphant as he said, “Cardassian shields are down!”
The Sloane’s phaser fire combined with the da Vinci’s torpedoes to destroy the Cardassian ship.
Gold took no joy in the destruction of the Cardassian vessel. He wouldn’t have done a single thing differently given the chance—the Federation was at war, after all—but he saw no reason to take any pleasure in death. One