Star Trek-TNG-Novel-Imzadi 1

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Star Trek-TNG-Novel-Imzadi 1 Page 18

by Peter David


  slipping off his shoulder. But then Tang was there,

  steadying him, although actually he seemed a bit more

  concerned about the weapon's safety than Riker's.

  "Here, you take it," said Riker, handing it off

  to Tang. Although Tang was a head shorter than

  Riker, he hefted the weapon as if it weighed a

  fraction of what it actually did. Riker tried

  to suppress his astonishment at the display of

  strength and was only partially successful. "What

  is that?"

  "This," said Tang, patting it proudly with his

  free hand, "is the latest in mobile

  ground-to-air defense. The portable Level

  10, shoulder-mounted phaser cannon, Model

  II."

  "Makes you wonder what Model I was like."

  "Model I blew up during field testing and

  destroyed half of Pluto. No one cared--it was

  a boring planet, anyway." Then, when he saw

  Riker's expression, he grinned, showing

  slightly irregular teeth. "I'm kidding,

  Lieutenant."

  "I knew you were," Riker lied. "How

  powerful is that thing?"

  "On full strength, I'd probably have a

  shot at knocking one of Betazed's moons out of

  orbit."

  "You're kidding again."

  Tang looked at him, his face inscrutable.

  "I didn't say I'd have a good shot at it."

  He placed the gun back on the wall and

  took a couple of small target-practice

  phasers out of their mountings. "Come on. I'll show

  you what we got set up."

  He led Riker over to another area, which was

  somewhat darkened, and handed him one of the phasers.

  Then from his belt he unclipped a couple of

  small, diamond-shaped devices. "Standard

  issue for ground security," he said. "Keeps

  us from getting stale no matter where we are."

  He tossed them into the air, and on their own, they

  started hurtling around the chamber. "Pick your shot

  and start firing, Lieutenant."

  Back to back, Riker and Tang began firing

  at the diamonds, trying to nail them in

  midflight. They glistened as they darted about the

  room, bobbing and weaving in no particular pattern.

  Riker managed to land a couple of shots; Tang

  landed far more.

  And as if the tricky piece of firing only

  required part of his attention, Tang said, "It's

  a woman, isn't it."

  "Pardon?"

  "One of the local girls, like you said you were going

  to be going out with. She's got you hooked ... no

  disrespect intended."

  "I'm not hooked, Sergeant. They have

  interesting philosophies. I'm trying to understand

  them."

  "How much philosophy do you need to get through

  life? If something attacks you, shoot it. If

  it doesn't attack you, leave it alone.

  Everything else is just window dressing."

  "That's a very narrow mind-set, Sergeant."

  "That mind-set is what keeps you alive,

  Lieutenant Riker. I'm still here. My men

  share my mind-set. They're still here. That's all

  that matters."

  "Hello, W."

  The two men stopped and turned, and there stood

  Wendy Roper. She was wearing a white

  jumpsuit that clung to her like a second skin.

  "Hi, Sergeant."

  "Ma'am," acknowledged Tang.

  She turned back to Riker and wasn't able

  to hide the disappointment in her face. "Will ...

  I haven't seen you around much."

  "I, um ... I've been very busy lately,

  Wendy."

  "Really?" she said with a pert angle of her

  head. "Doing what?"

  "I've ..."

  "The lieutenant has mostly been

  preoccupied with perimeter inspections, ma'am,"

  Tang said stiffly. "^w on the line is that

  we're ripe for an attack at any time."

  "Yes, anytime," echoed Riker.

  "A great deal of time being spent in security

  procedures. All out of concern for your safety,

  ma'am."

  "I see. Well ... when you do have some free

  moments, Lieutenant ... it'd be nice to get

  together. I thought we were hitting it off rather well."

  She nodded to Tang. "Good seeing you,

  Sergeant." And she walked off. Riker could hear

  her light footsteps receding up the stairs.

  "She's a nice girl," Tang observed.

  "Very pleasant companion, I'd think. And best

  of all--no offense intended--not overly

  intellectual, if you catch my drift."

  "I'd have to agree."

  "But I take it she's not the young lady ...?"

  "No. She's not."

  "Never burned the candle at both ends,

  Lieutenant?"

  Riker looked at him askance. "You mean

  juggled more than one relationship at a time?"

  "If you want to put it that way, sir, yes."

  "To be honest ... yes. But somehow, until

  I get things sorted out with Deanna--"

  "Deanna's the local girl?"

  "Yes. I don't know how to put it,

  Sergeant, but it wouldn't seem ... I don't

  know ... right somehow."

  Tang made a disapproving clucking noise.

  "Bad sign, Lieutenant. Very bad sign.

  Shields up, proceed with caution."

  "Noted and logged, Sergeant. Oh, by the

  way." Riker started targeting the flying

  diamonds again. "You didn't have to lie for me

  to Wendy."

  "I know, sir. On the other hand, I'm rather

  experienced with laying down covering fire. Just

  consider it all part of the service."

  "Well ... it's appreciated. I didn't

  exactly know how to tell her about Deanna ...

  especially when I'm not even sure if there's

  anything to tell."

  "No problem, Lieutenant."

  "I haven't even seen her in close to a

  week. Maybe I should head over to the university

  where she's got classes ..."

  Tang shook his head violently, although it did

  nothing to spoil his shot. "Big mistake, sir.

  Very big mistake. Keep in mind that she

  hasn't heard from you either. Now either that's weighing

  on her mind, in which case you should just let it simmer

  until she can't stand it anymore, or else

  she's not thinking about you at all, in which case you

  certainly don't need her. But you go pursuing

  her, you're giving her the strategic advantage.

  Not a good maneuver at all."

  "You make it sound like a military

  campaign."

  Tang looked at him. "Well, sir ...

  they do call it the war of the sexes. Wars are

  wars. Strategies are strategies. And winning"

  --Tang fired again, in rapid succession, and this

  time nailed both floating diamonds dead center,

  disengaging them. They clattered to the floor--?is

  what counts."

  "Winning isn't everything, Sergeant."

  "Winning isn't everything, sir ... but losing

  isn't anything."

  Riker tried to come up with a response to that, but

  couldn't. "That's true, I suppose."

  "Can't claim credit for it, sir. I wa
s

  told a twentieth-century philosopher came

  up with that. They sure knew their stuff back

  then."

  "What philosopher?"

  Tang paused and frowned. "Can't say I

  rec--wait. I do remember. His name was

  Charlie Brown."

  Riker considered it and nodded. "This Charlie

  Brown must have been a very wise man."

  "I expect he was, sir. I expect he

  was."

  CHAPTER 21

  Mark Roper was chuckling. "So when do I get

  my two hundred credits?"

  They were seated across from each other at the

  caf@e, where meeting for breakfast had evolved

  into a morning ritual. Riker looked up at

  Roper innocently while buttering a piece of

  rye toast. "What do you mean?"

  "The two hundred credits you owe me over the

  bet about Deanna."

  "I've got considerably more time on that,

  don't you think, Mark?" said Riker evenly.

  "Time?" Roper laughed. "Captain, time

  doesn't make any difference. She's cut

  ties with you. Now or doomsday won't make

  any difference. It's not going to happen.

  Lwaxana told me--"

  "She told you what?" demanded Riker, his

  eyes turning keen and a bit angry. "When did

  you speak to her?"

  "Casual conversation a week or so ago."

  "Why didn't you tell me?" He crunched

  down on the toast.

  "I am telling you. Frankly, you weren't

  even the topic of conversation. We were comparing notes

  about the difficulties of raising daughters. And

  Lwaxana was boasting about how Deanna listens

  to, and does, everything Lwaxana tells her to do

  because she has Deanna so well trained in her

  responsibilities as a daughter of the Fifth

  House. And an example she gave was how she

  shut down the relationship between Deanna and "t

  Starfleet fellow"' because it wasn't

  appropriate."

  "Oh, she did," said Riker icily.

  "Odd. That's not how I see it."

  "I don't imagine you would see it that way,"

  was Roper's calm response. He speared a

  piece of egg and said, "But then again ... I

  suppose how you see it doesn't matter all

  that much, does it, Captain?"

  Riker looked daggers at Roper, but the older

  man was the picture of tranquillity. And why

  shouldn't he be? As far as he was concerned, he'd

  won a two-hundred-credit bet.

  But Riker saw it a bit differently.

  The problem was, Sergeant Tang had made

  a valid point. Running in pursuit of

  Deanna, making calls to the mansion, trying

  to start things up when she was clearly so intimidated

  by her mother ... it didn't sound like a pleasant

  experience. The question was, which was the potentially more

  humiliating? Throwing himself at Deanna? Or

  losing the bet?

  He kept hearing Tang's voice in his head,

  warning him about strategy. Warning him ...

  ... his voice in his head.

  That's when it hit him.

  The next day, after an early-morning meeting with

  Tang to review the latest Starfleet reports

  about raider activity, Riker headed over to the

  university. He staked out a place for himself,

  seated on the edge of a large, ornate

  sculpture in the middle of the campus. And he

  simply waited. Sooner or later, Deanna

  was going to have to pass by.

  He spent half a day there, watching the sun

  pass over in the sky, watching the shadows shift

  position. They were simple, meaningless things. But

  he stared at them, focused on them, practicing.

  And as he did so, he slowed down his breathing,

  drawing out each breath. In through the nose, out through the

  mouth.

  He did so with more than just an interest in finding

  his calm, inner self. He had a purpose, a

  drive to his actions. He used the urgency and

  determination to focus his thoughts, focus everything he

  did.

  He had completely lost track of time, but

  something made him look up.

  There she was.

  She was walking across the campus, chatting with a

  couple of friends. She was laughing at something, andfora

  flash of an unreasonable instant, Riker felt

  tremendous resentment. Why should she be cheerful when

  he was feeling so much mental clutter?

  But that wasn't what this was about. He couldn't

  submit to that clutter; he had to brush away the

  confusion, concentrate fully on the matter at

  hand.

  He didn't look at her. Instead he was

  staring at the lengthening shadows, once again performing the

  steady in-and-out breathing. He reached down into himself,

  down into that determination that fueled the drive of his

  career. Except now that core of energy was going

  to fuel something else.

  He felt it welling up inside him, felt--

  or at least hoped he felt--the ability, the

  potential, there for him to tap. And now he sought out

  Deanna.

  There she was, her measured strides having

  taken her only a couple of meters beyond where she

  had been before. And she was looking his way.

  Apparently she had just noticed him, and

  she gently elbowed one of her girlfriends and nodded

  in Riker's direction. The other girl looked,

  too, and all three of them seemed to be sizing him

  up for a moment before putting their heads together and

  giggling.

  And Riker took Deanna's image, took

  a mental snapshot, and imprinted it onto his

  mind. And then he cut loose in an

  undisciplined, inelegant burst.

  You're afraid of me, he informed her.

  The reward to his herculean effort was immediate.

  Deanna was thrown off-step, and her head snapped

  around in astonishment. She looked right at him, and

  on her face was utter shock.

  To her credit, she recovered immediately. She

  fell back into step and made every effort to act as

  if nothing unusual had happened.

  But Riker knew, dammit, he knew.

  He tried to send again, but now his thoughts were

  cluttered, whirling and flushed with the excitement of his

  success. He couldn't pull himself together again fast

  enough--he hadn't developed nearly enough

  discipline.

  He realized that he'd had the equivalent of

  beginner's luck. That didn't change the fact,

  though, that he had let Deanna know precisely

  what he was thinking. He had, in essence, thrown

  down the gauntlet right on her own turf of the

  mind.

  She studiously looked away from him as she and

  her friends made their way across the campus.

  Deanna had, in fact, picked up the pace.

  It was clear to Riker why: she was concerned that he was

  going to come running after her.

  However, he had no intention of doing that. In

  fact, when Deanna was almost out of sight, she

  risked a quick glance behind her. All she saw was


  Riker sitting precisely where he had been before,

  his legs crossed, looking like a smug Bu.ha.

  Riker was sound asleep when an insistent

  rapping came at his door. He sat up in

  confusion, checking his chronometer. It was the middle

  of the night.

  The first thought he had was that there was some sort of

  attack. He tossed the blanket around himself and

  ran to the door.

  Deanna was standing there, her arms folded, her

  eyes bright.

  "I am not afraid of you."

  It took a moment for Riker to shift gears and

  realize that there was no danger from imminent alien

  assaults. Still, he composed himself quickly. "You

  could have fooled me."

  "Obviously you're not all that difficult

  to fool. On what grounds do you say that I'm

  afraid of you?"

  "On the grounds that you cut off all communication

  with me. On the grounds that you're steering clear of

  me."

  "I cut off communication with you because, as far as

  I was concerned, I had better things to do with my time

  than devote it to someone who couldn't possibly

  understand the subtleties of our philosophies."

  "Well, obviously I'm understanding something,"

  he said, leaning against the doorframe, "because I

  projected thoughts to you."

  "A fluke. Pure happenstance. Besides, you

  didn't do it for the satisfaction of opening up your

  mind. You did it so that you could get my attention;

  maybe even get back at me, in some crude

  way. As for steering clear of you, my presence here

  should be enough to show how ridiculous that is. On what

  grounds can you--?"

  "On the grounds," Riker interrupted

  remorselessly, "that every time you're close to me you

  start to lose control. Your body starts sending you

  signals that your brain doesn't want to accept.

  Face it, Deanna ... I'm upsetting your

  nice little intellectual applecart."

  Her gaze was steady and unrelenting. "Get

  dressed."

  "Where are we going?"

  "Out."

  "Where? Why should I go with you if you won't

  tell me where it is we're going."

  She looked at him defiantly. "What's the

  matter, Lieutenant, afraid of me?"

  "All right," he said after a moment. "Give

  me a couple of minutes."

  "Take all the time you want."

  It was a fairly warm night. Where Deanna

  stood, she was framed in the moonlight reflecting

  off a large lake, providing some degree of

  illumination. Her arms were crossed as if she were

  cold.

 

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