What's Past_ The Future Begins (Book 2) - Michael Schuster [12]
Nechayev held her hand out. “Your padd please, Captain Scott.”
Scotty slipped his hands behind his back, the padd still clutched in them. “I don’t think this is right. We can’t just steal from another planet.”
“Captain Scott,” said Nechayev with a sigh, “I had hoped this would not happen. You know as well as I do that if the Federation wants to stop losing this war, we need that ship.”
“Admiral, I don’t deny that! I just don’t think we should be stealin’ from potential member planets—or any other planets—just because it’s more convenient for us!”
Nechayev shook her head. “Captain Scott, it’s not as though you don’t know Starfleet can be a little…underhanded at times. I seem to recall you once joined a commando squad on a mission into Romulan space to steal a prototype vessel?”
“That’s not the same—” began Scotty.
Nechayev cut him off. “And of course, you had no problem with stealing from the Federation itself when you conspired with Captain Kirk to sabotage the original Excelsior and steal the Enterprise out of spacedock.” She motioned to Piñiero, who stepped forward to right in front of Scotty, her hand extended. “Captain Scott, hand over that padd. That’s an order.”
Just as when he had read the sealed orders earlier that night, Scotty couldn’t refuse a direct order like that. He brought his hand from behind his back, and dropped the padd into Piñiero’s hand. Piñiero flipped it on and skimmed through the data. “It’s all here, Admiral,” she said. “The coordinates, the layout of the facility, everything.”
“Get to the bridge and break orbit,” ordered Nechayev. “The Catherine Mary is waiting at Delphi Ardu for that information.”
“Yes, Admiral.” Nechayev held out her hand, and Piñiero gave her the padd. Nechayev gave some further orders about sending an apology to the high cyning for the abrupt departure, and then Piñiero left.
“You don’t have to be rude to them as well, Admiral!” exclaimed Scotty. “At least do them the courtesy of finishin’ out your commitment here.”
“I can’t afford to waste any time here, Captain Scott. Captain Wrightwell needs that information as soon as possible if his strike team is going to capture that Breen frigate, and we can’t risk transmitting it, even in code.” She skimmed through the data on the padd herself. “Good work, Captain Scott. I think you’ll understand if I can’t put you up for commendation, though.” She began to head for the door.
“Now wait just a second, Admiral,” called Scotty, halting her in midstride. “I want to tell you somethin’.”
Nechayev turned, a look of curiosity evident on her face. “And what’s that, Captain Scott?”
Scotty paused for a moment, not sure if he really wanted to go through with this, not sure if he really wanted to say the words or not. Then he thought, The hell with this. “Admiral, I quit.”
For the first time he had ever seen, Nechayev looked like she was at a loss for words. “You what?”
“I quit,” he repeated. “I resign.”
“Captain Scott,” began Nechayev, “surely—”
“This has nothing to do with the stealin’,” said Scotty. “Well, it does, but that’s not the reason. The reason is that you manipulated me, Admiral. You deliberately engineered the entire situation so I would have to obey those orders.” Scotty wasn’t the type to disobey orders.
That’s not true, Scotty thought. How many times did you disobey orders under Captain Kirk? But there was a difference. Under Kirk, Scotty had never been the one initiating the disobeying. He had always been following orders, really; it was just that they had been the captain’s orders and not Starfleet’s. And now the captain was dead…
“What about your job with the S.C.E.?” asked Nechayev. It was clear that she still couldn’t quite believe that Scotty would end his Fleet career for such a reason.
“Admiral, you yourself told me I’ve not been doing that at all,” said Scotty. “There’s nothing to tie me to Starfleet anymore.” In truth, there hadn’t been since he finished his work on the Enterprise-E, if even then. “This century’s Starfleet isn’t for me if this is the way it treats its officers.