“Can I help you, sir?” the man asked Dane.
“You can indeed,” the captain told him. “You can send me up to the Maverick. She’s in Earth orbit.”
He stepped up onto the transporter disc and waited for the operator to comply. But it didn’t happen.
“I wasn’t notified of any transports this evening,” the man said.
Dane looked at him. “So?”
The transporter operator frowned. “My orders require me to follow a schedule, sir. You’re not on my schedule.”
Dane came down off the disc and crossed the room. “Let’s see that schedule you’re talking about.”
The man pointed it out on his monitor. “You see, sir? There’s no mention of any transports this evening.”
“That’s funny,” said Dane, punching in a little-known access code and then tapping his name out. Letter by letter, it appeared on the screen. “It looks to me like you’ve got a transport scheduled after all.”
The operator read Dane’s name. Then he looked at the captain, amazed. “How did you do that?”
Dane smiled a thin smile. “I’ve been doing it since I was ten. It’s one of the perks of growing up a Command brat. Now are you going to transport me or do I have to do it myself?”
The dark-haired man hesitated for a moment. Then he said, “I’m ready when you are, sir.”
“Thanks a bunch,” Dane told him.
Crossing the room again, he stepped up onto the transporter disc. A moment later, he saw the operator go to work.
In less than a minute, the captain’s surroundings vanished—and he found himself in a much smaller chamber. He recognized it as the transporter room of a Christopher-class starship.
How about that, he thought, I’m still in one piece. Guess those eggheads knew what they were doing.
There was a tall, balding man in a black-and-gold Earth Command uniform standing beside the control console. “Welcome to the Maverick,” he said. “I’m Captain Fitzgerald.”
His tone told Dane that he wouldn’t have minded waiting until morning to bring his replacement aboard. In fact, he probably wouldn’t have minded waiting until the millennium.
“I imagine you’ll want to see the ship,” Fitzgerald said.
Descending from the disc, Dane made his way across the room. “Look,” he told his predecessor, “I know my way around a Christopher. You don’t have to hold my hand if you’ve got something better to do.”
He had meant it as a magnanimous gesture. If it were his vessel, he would have hated the idea of giving his successor a tour.
But Fitzgerald obviously didn’t see it that way. “It’s my duty to show you around, Captain. I’m going to see that duty done.”
Dane shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
Together, they left the transporter room and headed down the corridor to the nearest turbolift. En route, they passed a couple of lieutenants who acknowledged Fitzgerald but didn’t so much as glance at Dane.
“Friendly crew you’ve got here,” he noted. “I guess they’re no more thrilled about giving up their ship than you are.”
Fitzgerald shot him a stern look. “Frankly, it’s not just a matter of giving up the Maverick. It’s that we’re giving it up to someone who’s never worn the uniform.”
Dane stiffened at the unexpected arrogance behind the rebuke. Who did these Earth Command types think they were? A superior species?
“It’s funny,” he said, refusing to rise to the bait. “I seem to hear that sort of thing a lot lately.”
“And how do you respond?” Fitzgerald asked.
“Is that meant to be a gibe?” Dane countered bluntly.
“No. I’d really like to know,” said Fitzgerald, allowing only the merest note of irony to creep into his voice.
Dane opened the doors with a tap of the pad on the bulkhead beside them. “Usually,” he said in a matter-of-fact tone, “I tell them to go to hell. But that’s only when they’re not performing a life or death service like playing tour guide.”
Fitzgerald’s eyes became daggers as the doors finished sliding open. “Understand something, Captain. This vessel saw us through the worst of the war. If I hear you’re mistreating her, I’ll personally shove you out a missile tube.”
Dane tried to keep a lid on his emotions as he entered the lift compartment. “Let’s make a deal,” he said as calmly as he could. “You don’t make any more stupid threats and I’ll treat this ship better than you ever did. I’ll bring her flowers twice a week, wine her and dine her, bring her chocolates, the works. What do you say?”
Fitzgerald reddened. “That’s not what I meant.”
“Oh?” said Dane, feigning surprise. “Then what did you mean? That I was purposely going to bounce her through an asteroid belt?”
The other man scowled, accentuating the lines in his face. “I meant this ship is a whole lot more than you deserve.”
“Maybe so,” Dane replied evenly. “But then, the galaxy seldom plays fair, Captain. As someone who’s fought a war all by himself, you should appreciate that.” He indicated the inside of the turbolift with a flourish. “Care to join the tour?”
Biting his lip, Fitzgerald stepped inside and pressed the stud that closed the doors. Then he punched in a destination.
But before he could send the lift on its way, Dane canceled the command and instituted one of his own. “Let’s go straight to the bridge,” he said. “That’s the part I’m really looking forward to.”
Fitzgerald didn’t say anything—either at that moment or any other—as the lift made its way to the Maverick’ s command nexus. When they arrived, Dane took it on himself to open the doors.
As they slid apart, he absorbed the sight of his new bridge—a gold enclosure full of sleek, black consoles. Of course, it looked a lot like the bridges he had seen on a half dozen other Christophers in his lifetime. But there was something about this one that made Dane’s heart skip a beat.
“Captain on the bridge,” someone announced.
Dane didn’t know if the man was talking about him or Fitzgerald. What’s more, he didn’t much care.
“At ease,” he said, speaking up before his counterpart could.
There were eight officers on the bridge. They all looked at him—none of them with the least bit of kindness.
“This is Captain Dane,” Fitzgerald pointed out dutifully. “The new commanding officer of—”
“They don’t care who I am,” Dane interjected. “They’re like you in that regard, Captain. They just want to know me well enough to hate me for taking their ship away.”
The bridge officers stared at him disbelievingly. Obviously, they had never heard anyone speak that way to their superior.
“So let’s do everyone a favor,” Dane went on. “Now that Captain Fitzgerald has given me my tour—and let me tell you, what a splendid tour it was—why don’t you all take a last look around the ship? Go ahead. I can handle the bridge by myself.”
Fitzgerald glared at him. “You’re out of your mind. This is a Christopher, man. If something goes wrong—”
“I’ll take my chances,” Dane told him. “And unless I’m mistaken, it’s my option to do that ...since this vessel officially stopped being Earth Command property the moment you slipped into orbit.”
The muscles worked furiously in Fitzgerald’s jaw. “That’s exactly right,” he conceded. “I commend you on your grasp of protocol, Captain.”
“Please,” said Dane. “You’ll give me a swelled head. Now go. Get out of here, all of you.”
The officers glanced at Fitzgerald, who nodded reluctantly. Then, little by little, they filed into the turbolift. It took two trips for the compartment to take them all away, but eventually it did its job.
When the doors slid closed on the second group, Dane walked over to the captain’s chair and sat down. He looked around at the empty duty stations, both fore and aft, and imagined them full of the officers he had signed a few hours earlier, their faces turned to him for o
rders.
Dane wouldn’t have admitted it out loud, but he had never been so scared in all his life.
CHAPTER
14
WEAPONS OFFICER MORGAN KELLY TOOK A DEEP BREATH and considered herself in the full-length mirror.
Like everyone else on the Christopher-class vessel Peregrine, she wore an open-collared blue uniform with a black mock-turtle pullover underneath it. A gold Starfleet chevron graced the uniform’s left breast, and Kelly’s rank of lieutenant was denoted by two gold bands encircling her right sleeve.
She tilted her redhaired head to one side and frowned. She had worn the gold and black of Earth Command for so long she had come to think of it as part of her natural coloring. A blue uniform looked as inappropriate as a hot-pink atomic missile.
But there it was, Kelly mused, her frown deepening. And she would get used to it. She would have to.
The sound of chimes brought her out of her reverie. Kelly turned to the double set of sliding doors that separated her quarters from the corridor beyond and wondered who might be calling on her.
Maybe it was the engineer she had met earlier, who had gotten lost looking for the mess hall. Or yet another lieutenant j.g., wondering if she had received her full complement of toiletries . . .
It couldn’t be a friend. After all, the lieutenant only had one of those on the ship...and he was waiting for her on the bridge.
“I’m coming,” she sighed.
Crossing the room, Kelly pressed the pad in the bulkhead beside the sliding doors and watched them hiss open. They revealed a silver-skinned, ruby-eyed figure in a uniform as blue as her own.
“Captain Cobaryn—?” she said, unable to conceal her surprise.
He inclined his head slightly. “May I come in?”
Kelly hesitated for a moment. Then she realized she really had no choice in the matter. “Of course. But I should tell you, I’m—”
“Due on the bridge in ten minutes,” the Rigelian said, finishing her declaration for her. He fashioned a smile, stretching the series of ridges that ran from his temple to his jaw. “I know. I spoke with Captain Shumar before I transported over.”
“Did you?” the lieutenant responded, getting the feeling that she had been the victim of some kind of conspiracy. I’ll be the first officer in Starfleet to kill my captain, she told herself.
“Yes,” Cobaryn rejoined. “I wish to speak with you.”
Of course you do, she replied inwardly.
After all, Cobaryn had taken every opportunity to speak with her back on Earth Base Fourteen in the aftermath of the Romulan assault. It hardly came as a shock that he wanted to speak with her now.
And he had gone to some pretty great lengths to do so. All six of the fleet’s Christophers were supposed to leave Earth orbit in less than an hour, and the Rigelian had a command of his own to attend to. There might even have been a regulation prohibiting a captain from leaving his vessel at such a momentous juncture.
If there was, Cobaryn seemed unaware of it . . . or else, for the sake of his infatuation with Kelly, he had decided to ignore it.
“Look,” she said, “I—”
He held up a three-fingered hand. “Please,” he insisted gently, “I will not be long, I promise.”
The lieutenant regarded her visitor. He seemed to mean it. “All right,” she told him, folding her arms across her chest.
Cobaryn offered her another smile—his best one yet. “First,” he said, “I would like to apologize for my behavior back at Earth Base Fourteen. In retrospect, I see that my attentions must have been a burden to you. In my defense, I can only state my ignorance of human courtship rituals.”
An apology was the last thing she had expected. “Don’t worry about it,” she found herself saying. “In a way, it was kind of flattering.”
The captain inclined his hairless head. “Thank you for understanding. There is only one other thing. . . .”
But he didn’t say what it was. At least, not right away. Whatever it was, he seemed nervous about it.
As much as he had annoyed her at the base, Kelly couldn’t help sympathizing with the man. “One other thing?” she echoed, trying to be helpful.
“Yes,” said Cobaryn. He seemed to steel himself. “If it is not too much trouble, I would like a favor from you.”
She looked at him askance, uncertain of what he was asking but already not liking the sound of it. “What kind of favor?”
His eyes seemed to soften. “The kind a knight of old received from his lady fair, so he could carry it with him on his journeys and accomplish great things in her name.”
Kelly felt her heart melt in her chest. It was far and away the most romantic thing anyone had ever suggested to her, and it caught her completely off guard. For a second or two, she couldn’t speak.
Cobaryn winced. “You do not think it is a good idea?”
The lieutenant shook her head, trying to regain her composure. “I . . .I’m not sure what I think.”
He shrugged. “Again, I must apologize. It seemed like a good solution to both our problems. After all, if I had a favor, I could perhaps feel content worshiping you from afar.”
Kelly sighed. She hadn’t intended to. It just came out.
This is crazy, she told herself. Cobaryn was an alien—a being from another world. What did he know of knightly virtues? Or of chivalry? And yet she had to admit, he embodied them better than any human she had ever met.
“I . . . see you’ve been doing some reading,” she observed.
“A little,” Cobaryn admitted. He looked sad in a peculiarly Rigelian way. “Well, then, good luck, Lieutenant Kelly. I trust you and I will meet again someday.”
He extended his hand to shake hers. For a moment, she considered it. Then, certain that she had gone insane, she held up her forefinger.
“Give me a second,” she said.
There was a set of drawers built into the bulkhead beside her bed. The lieutenant pulled open the third one from the top and rifled through it, searching for something. It took a while, but she found it.
Then she turned around and tossed it to Cobaryn. He snatched it out of the air, opened his hand, and studied it. Then he looked up at Kelly, a grin spreading awkwardly across his face.
“Thank you,” he told her, with feeling.
She smiled back, unable to help herself. “Don’t mention it.”
Still grinning, the captain tucked her favor into an inside pocket of his uniform, where it created only a slightly noticeable bulge. Then, with obvious reluctance, he turned, opened the doors to her quarters, and left her standing there.
As the doors whispered closed again, Kelly had to remind herself to breathe. Come on, she thought. Get a grip on yourself.
Cobaryn’s gesture was a romantic notion, no question. But it hadn’t come from Prince Charming. It had come from a guy she didn’t have the slightest feelings for.
A guy from another planet, for heaven’s sakes.
Now, the lieutenant told herself, if it had been the Cochrane jockey who had asked for her favor . . . that would have been a different story. That would have been unbelievable.
Chuckling to herself, she pulled down on the front of her uniform and put on her game face. Then she tapped the door controls, left her quarters, and reported to the bridge.
Where she would, in her own unobtrusive way, give Captain Shumar the dirtiest look she could muster.
Hiro Matsura got up from his center seat on the Yellowjacket and faced his viewscreen, where the image of Director Abute had just appeared.
The captain wasn’t required to get up. Certainly, none of his bridge officers had risen from their consoles. But Matsura wanted to show his appreciation of the moment, his respect for its place in history.
For weeks they had talked about a Starfleet. They had selected captains and crews for a Starfleet. And now, for the first time, there would actually be a Starfleet.
“I bid you a good morning,” said Abute, his dark eyes twinkling
over his aquiline nose. “Of course, for the United Federation of Planets it is already a good morning. More than two hundred of our bravest men and women, individuals representing fourteen species in all, are embarking from Earth orbit to pursue their destinies among the stars.
“Before long,” the director told them, “there will be many more of you, plying the void in the kind of ships we’ve only been able to dream about. But for now, there is only you—a handful of determined trailblazers who will set the standard for all who follow. The Federation is watching each and every one of you, wishing you the best of good fortune. Make us proud. Show us what serving in Starfleet is all about.”
And what was it about? the captain wondered. Unfortunately, it was still too soon to say.
Of course, Matsura knew what he wanted it to be. The same thing Admiral Walker wanted it to be—a defense force like no other. But as long as Clarisse Dumont’s camp had a say in things, that future was uncertain.
Abute smiled with undisguised pride. “You have my permission to leave orbit,” he told them. “Bon voyage.” A moment later his image vanished, and their orbital view of Earth was restored.
Matsura didn’t take his eyes off the viewscreen. He wanted to remember how the sunlight hit the cloud-swaddled Earth when he left on his first Starfleet mission. He wanted to tell his grandchildren about it.
“Mr. Barker,” he said finally, “bring us about.”
There was no response.
The captain turned to his left to look at his helmsman. The man ensconced behind the console there was staring back at him, looking a little discomfited. And for good reason.
His name wasn’t Barker. It was McCallum. Barker had piloted Matsura’s ship when it flew under the aegis of Earth Command.
The captain had wanted to take the helmsman with him when his ship became Starfleet property. However, he had been forced to adhere to Abute’s quotas, and that meant making some hard decisions.
“Mr. McCallum,” he amended, “bring us about.”
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