Star Trek - TNG - Vendetta

by Peter David

  ignored the starbase," observed Shelby.

  "Obviously, they were in something of a hurry,"

  said Riker. "And I think I know what they were in

  a hurry for."

  He glanced out the viewing port. Ahead of

  them, space was warping around the speeding shape of the

  planet-killer, still on its head-on course

  to penetrate Borg space. Thus far the

  Enterprise and the Chekov were keeping pace, but

  it was not an easy task, and it required careful

  monitoring of the engines.

  Riker shook his head in amazement. That it would

  take years to achieve her goal was clearly of

  no interest to her at all. As she had said, she

  had all the time in the universe.

  It was time that the Enterprise did not share, which

  Data was just now pointing out. "If we can assume

  that the planet-killer is capable of surviving the

  next Borg attack, the next densely

  populated system will be that of the Gorn.

  Furthermore, beyond that she will inevitably--

  presuming she does not alter her course--enter a

  section of Romulan space."

  "Just perfect," said Riker sarcastically.

  "Why doesn't she just open fire on the

  Federation headquarters and be done with it?" demanded

  Korsmo, sounding even more frustrated. "She's

  going to have the entire galaxy in pieces before she's

  through."

  "I am aware of what she might and might not

  do, Captain," said Picard quietly.

  "Well, she's not going to have the chance," said

  Korsmo. "I received a communique from

  Starfleet ..."

  "Yes, I know," Picard told him. "We

  received the same one."

  Korsmo seemed surprised for a moment, but then

  shrugged. "Then you know."

  Crusher looked confused, as did Troi and

  La Forge. "Well I don't know," said the

  doctor. "Someone care to let me in on it?"

  "Starfleet is assembling a fleet

  to intercept her," said Korsmo with great

  satisfaction. "If the Borg don't get her,

  we definitely will."

  There was silence in the briefing room for a moment.

  Picard cast a glance at Shelby, who was seated

  next to her captain but clearly wasn't sharing his

  enthusiasm. Nor did Riker look ecstatic.

  "Problem, Commander? Commanders?" said

  Picard.

  Shelby looked at Riker. "It's Wolf

  359 all over again."

  "My thoughts exactly," said Riker.

  "I do not like what you're implying at all,"

  declared Korsmo. "Starfleet can no more let that

  woman carve her way through the galaxy than they

  could let the Borg assault us unanswered. For a

  galaxy to be at peace, that peace must be

  protected. Starfleet and the Federation aren't

  simply going to turn away when such a massive

  threat presents itself, whether it be the

  planet-killer or the Borg. And I will have you

  know, young officers," he added stiffly, "that Wolf

  359 was heroism at its finest!"

  "Wolf 359 was a massacre," said Riker.

  "I will never forget the look on Admiral

  Hanson's face when he told us of the fight he

  was going to give the Borg. He was like a

  war-horse put back into harness. You weren't there

  to see that, Captains. We saw it. A brave

  defender going off to be slaughtered. And we saw

  the graveyard of ships that were left behind in the

  Borg's wake."

  "And that was against one Borg ship," Shelby

  said. "Now you're telling us that a fleet is being

  assembled--a fleet which can't possibly be as

  powerful as the one at Wolf, because most of the best

  ships were lost there--and it's going up against a foe

  that's more powerful."

  Now Picard cleared his throat loudly and said,

  in a tone that was indicating that no further discussion

  on that topic was being tolerated, "It's of far more

  importance, I think, that we deal with the here and now.

  And the here and now would indicate that, sooner rather than

  later, depending upon their speed, we will be encountering

  three Borg ships. Mr. La Forge, what are

  our options?"

  "We've developed ways to temporarily

  stall the Borg during an attack," said

  Geordi. "Fluctuating the phaser resonance

  frequencies tampers with their ability to adjust

  to our weapons. Also varying the nutonics slows

  down their ability to overcome our deflectors,

  although only for a matter of seconds."

  "There was something else you did. Memoranda were

  circulated throughout Starfleet," said Korsmo,

  "and Shelby was telling me about it as well, with the

  deflector dish ..."

  Geordi's head bobbed up and down.

  "We discovered that the power nodules of the Borg were

  susceptible to phaser frequencies along the

  higher end of the band. It caused system-wide

  drops throughout the Borg ship when fired on them.

  Figuring that more is better, we generated a

  concentrated burst of energy using power from the warp

  engines, channeled through the deflector dish,

  to give us more punch than phasers or photon

  torpedoes could have provided. The problem was that

  since it took so much power, we couldn't maneuver

  at warp speed. Furthermore, it caused

  failure in the warp reactor core primary

  coolant system, and we came damned close

  to cracking the dilithium crystals."

  "The result?" asked Korsmo.

  Geordi shifted uncomfortably in his chair,

  and no one else around the table looked particularly

  at ease. "Nothing. The Borg shields

  absorbed it."

  "That would be my doing," admitted Picard.

  "When the Borg "recruited" me, they took

  all of our possible planned strategies from my

  mind."

  "The other drawback is that it left us

  virtual sitting ducks," said Riker. "That

  kind of failure against one Borg ship is bad

  enough. Trying it again with two other ships to attack

  you while you're making yourself vulnerable attacking a

  third is even more risky."

  "They can only prepare for what they knew we

  could do, up to the point where they abducted the

  captain," said Geordi. "But they don't know

  about things that we've come up with since."

  "You have something in mind, Mr. La Forge?"

  asked Picard.

  "Something that's worth a shot," said Geordi.

  "Wesley had been conducting experiments with

  creating warp bubbles."

  "Oh God, don't remind me," said

  Beverly Crusher.

  "But it may be something we can use," Geordi

  continued. "All the equations and records of the

  experiment are in the computer, and I've been

  looking them over from time to time when I had a spare

  few minutes. And I've been discussing

  possibilities with Data ..."

  "We have theorized," Data said, "that it would be

  possible to program into the computer a remix of

/>   matter and antimatter to duplicate, on a

  large scale, the warp bubble that

  Wesley created."

  "In the main engines?" said Picard, looking

  somewhat taken aback.

  "No, sir," said Data. "The mixture would

  be contained in the emergency antimatter generator

  on the lower engineering hull. However, upon command, the

  computer would then channel it through the warp field

  generators on the outboard nacelles. The warp

  bubble would interact with the subspace field of the

  Borg ship and encapsulate it in a shrinking

  universal field similar to the one which trapped

  Doctor Crusher. It would, for all intents and

  purposes, remove the affected ship from our

  space-time continuum."

  "So we would have to maneuver close enough to the

  Borg vessel to, essentially, "drop off"

  the warp bubble on their subspace field," said

  Picard.

  "Yes, sir," confirmed Geordi. "And we

  would have to keep moving at impulse power to leave the

  discharge behind. We'd have maybe three seconds

  to get away--at impulse power--or risk being

  encompassed in the warp bubble along with the Borg

  ship."

  "Sounds dicey," admitted Riker.

  "How long would it take you to prepare the

  emergency antimatter generator?" asked

  Picard.

  "Wesley did all the theoretical groundwork

  when he was first doing his experiments." Geordi

  shrugged. "This is just a straightforward application.

  Maybe half an hour."

  "Make it so." Picard paused. "Captain

  Korsmo, I--"

  But he didn't get to complete the sentence, as

  the briefing room communicator sounded.

  "Captain," came Chafin's voice, "the

  planet-killer is reducing speed."

  "Are there Borg ships ahead?"

  "No, sir."

  "Maybe it's running out of gas," said

  Korsmo.

  The briefing room doors opened and Guinan

  entered quickly. Korsmo looked up and sighed in

  exasperation, but kept his peace. Guinan, for her

  part, ignored him completely but instead went

  straight to Picard.

  "She wants to see us."

  "Wants to?" said Picard, not having to ask

  who Guinan meant by "she."

  "Perhaps "wants to" is too strong a

  term," allowed Guinan. "She will see us. That

  alone is a breakthrough."

  "What she is that?" asked Korsmo. "The

  woman in the planet-killer?"

  "Captain," Chafin's voice came, "it's

  dropping out of warp."

  "Bring us alongside," said Picard, and

  stood. "Transporter room. Prepare for four

  to beam aboard the planet-killer. Doctor,

  Guinan, Mr. Data, with me."

  "No, sir!" Riker said immediately, "that would

  be--"

  "The only logical course of action," said

  Picard with quiet confidence. "This may be our

  only chance to ally the planet-killer solidly

  with Federation interests. If that can be accomplished,

  we need never worry about the threat of the Borg

  again. Mr. La Forge, Counselor Troi,

  tell me of the Bonaventure woman. Could she be

  useful somehow in negotiating with Delcara?"

  "You can't negotiate with her, Picard,"

  Korsmo now said. "She's a terrorist! She

  does what she wants, where she wants. There can

  be no compromise with someone like that."

  Picard simply stared at him icily, and then

  said very quietly, as if Korsmo had not even

  spoken, "I'm waiting for an answer to my question,

  Counselor."

  "Using Reannon would not be advisable," said

  Troi. "She is at a very delicate stage in

  her recovery, and very unpredictable. She could do

  as much harm as good."

  "I agree," said Geordi.

  "Very well, then. She'll stay here." And

  seeing Riker's mouth about to open, Picard quickly

  interrupted with a curt, "There is nothing to discuss,

  Number One."

  "Captain," Shelby now said, leaning forward,

  "this is not the time."

  "Commander Shelby is right, sir. You can't be

  away from the Enterprise now. The Borg are

  coming."

  Picard turned to Riker, and his first officer

  understood immediately from the look in Picard's face.

  This was more than determination on Picard's part

  to take the risk himself. This was a personal

  fulfillment of a lifelong quest on the part of his

  captain, and he came to the quiet realization that

  there was no way in hell he was going to be

  able to get in this man's way.

  "You will have to give them my regrets," said

  Picard.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Korsmo strode onto the bridge of the

  Chekov and dropped into the command chair. Shelby

  followed a few steps behind him, looking far more

  composed and controlled.

  "Against every common sense move," Korsmo said,

  more to himself than anything. But everyone on the bridge

  heard, and turned towards him with curiosity.

  "Sir?" asked the man at ops.

  Korsmo didn't look at anyone as he just

  shook his head and said, "There are certain people in the

  galaxy who go by the book, who always do the

  correct thing, and they lead satisfactory, but

  uninspiring, careers. And then there are the ones who

  do whatever the hell they feel like, and they get the

  attention and acclaim. Now, you want to tell me

  what you call that?"

  There was silence on the bridge for a moment, and

  then Shelby said, simply and clearly, "I

  call that justice."

  Korsmo fired her a look that wasn't

  filled with a great deal of affection. "Thank you for

  sharing that with us, Commander."

  Shelby said nothing, just inclined her head

  slightly as if giving a tongue-in-cheek

  "You're welcome."

  Korsmo looked at the screen, at the

  planet-killer that was now stationary in space. The

  Enterprise had drawn closer, and Korsmo

  said, "Hold our position here."

  "Sir," said Hobson in surprise. "The

  planet-killer had been generating a field

  scrambler that had made transport aboard

  impossible. But sensors are detecting that a

  hole has just been created in the field. Should

  we--?"

  "No," said Korsmo quietly. "Take no

  action. Hold us steady. You see, we weren't

  invited."

  Guinan, Picard, Data, and Troi stepped

  up onto the transporter platform. Worf and

  Riker stood at the base, while O'Brien

  checked his readouts. "Transportation is now

  possible, sir," said O'Brien, not

  without some surprise. "And I'm reading a

  transporter beacon signal from within the

  planet-killer. Someone has someplace very

  specific they want me to send you."

  "Then we shan't disappoint them," Picard

  said.

  "Sir, I still recommend against this," said

  Riker firmly, though he
did not think, at this

  point, that Picard was going to listen to him. In that

  he was correct.

  "Recommendation noted, Number One."

  Now Worf stepped forward and proffered a

  phaser. "Sir, you should have this with you."

  "I don't think that will be necessary, Mr.

  Worf."

  In a firm, even fierce voice, Worf

  said, "I do."

  Picard was slightly surprised by the vehemence

  of his security head. He also understood it. It was

  a very difficult thing to ask a Klingon to stand by and

  permit a commanding officer to do some thing that he,

  Worf, felt was inappropriate. Klingons were

  driven by an immense sense of duty, and Worf

  was in tremendous conflict. On the one hand, he was

  obligated to obey the wishes of his captain. On

  the other hand, he felt duty-bound to protect his

  commanding officer from harm.

  As much out of consideration for Worf's feelings as

  anything else, Picard took the phaser.

  "Thank you, Lieutenant," he said.

  Worf gave a curt nod and stepped back,

  his arms folded across his broad chest.

  Picard stepped back up onto the

  transporter platform and glanced at Guinan.

  "Your first time through a transporter?"

  She shrugged. "First time for everything."

  Picard nodded and then turned to O'Brien.

  "Energize," he said.

  They shimmered and vanished off the transporter

  pads.

  "Vaya con dios," murmured Riker.

  Picard was staring at himself.

  He took a step back and reflexively his

  hand went towards his phaser. Then he realized that

  the individual he was facing, who looked just like

  him, was doing the exact same thing. In less than

  a second upon first seeing his reflection he

  realized what it was, and he felt a bit

  sheepish. He retreated a step farther

  so that he could get a look around.

  "Just as Geordi surmised," said Picard.

  "Crystal."

  Picard, Troi, and Guinan stood in the

  middle of their surroundings, taking it all in.

  Troi and Picard were clearly amazed at what

  they saw. Guinan, for her part, merely stood

  impassively and looked around as if she had seen

  it all before.

  All around them, for as far and as high as they could

  see, they were surrounded by intricately designed

  structures from a material that looked for all the

  world like crystal.

  The walls, vast sheets and pillars of

  crystal, reflected endlessly the images of the

  four Enterprise visitors. Picard reached out

  tentatively, after consulting with Data's