Titan 5 - Over a Torrent Sea (15 page)

Aili, though, had done it more than most—not just the odd, infrequent fling after several years of parenthood had left her aching for release, but hundreds of dalliances with alien males, females, and miscellanea, starting before her first child had even learned to walk on land. It hadn’t been cheating in the human sense; Selkies didn’t mate monogamously, and indeed rarely had more than two children with the same partner. And she didn’t feel guilty about the sex itself; that was just a natural part of life to her, one she still indulged regularly. What she regretted was her negligence, indulging herself while she left her children in the care of her siblings and neighbors, making one excuse after another until she had realized that she no longer needed to pretend because everyone knew what she really was. Everyone except the offworlders who didn’t understand or didn’t care.

Will Riker would have cared, had he known. But to him, it had been a pleasant, harmless interlude, a brief encounter he remembered fondly. (Well, not that brief. He’d lasted most of the night, actually one of her longer affairs.) She couldn’t confront him with the reality of what a sor
did thing she’d involved him in. He would no doubt feel guilty, as though he’d taken advantage of her in some way. At least, it would spoil a memory that was wholesome and happy to him, and she needed at least one of them to feel that way about it.

But all she could remember now when she thought back on that night was that she’d been indulging herself while her two-year-old son was at Aili’s eldest sister’s home, crying and burning up from a
lekipanai
infection that kept the child up all night while his mother was off keeping Will Riker up all night. And now Will Riker was asking
her
for advice on how to be a good parent?

He was watching her expectantly, his expression so innocent, so open. What could she say to him? “There’s nothing I—There’s no magic formula. I don’t know…I don’t know what your daughter will be like, what challenges you’ll face. Just…make sure you always try to do right by her. And…never take her for granted.”

He smiled. “I never could.”

Then he shook his head and chuckled. “It’s hard to believe you have grown children who must be parents themselves now. It doesn’t seem it’s been that long since we—uh, met.” He cleared his throat. “You must miss them a lot.”

She stared out at the sea. “You can’t imagine.”

TITAN

“I
’ve been getting complaints from the security staff, Tuvok,” Deanna said, resting her hands atop her belly and striving to maintain her serenity despite the fact that her daughter seemed to be trying to kick her way out of the womb. “They don’t understand why you’re still conducting holodeck combat drills involving the Borg.”

On the chair opposite her, Tuvok sat with his wonted erectness and cocked a brow. “I was not aware that tactical training procedures fell within your bailiwick, Counselor.”

“I’m more interested in understanding why you continue to train them to fight the Borg. There are no more Borg.”

“It is best to keep security personnel ready to face any threat. The Borg are the most formidable, adaptable threat Starfleet has ever faced, and thus are an excellent virtual opponent to train against.”

“If you can beat them, you can beat anybody.”

“Crudely put, but it approximates the principle.” He took a breath. “Also…we have encountered groups of Borg severed from the Collective before. We do not know if all such groups were affected by the Caeliar transformation. We can never entirely rule out the possibility that some aspect of the Borg may achieve a resurgence in the future. Or that we may encounter another cyborg race developing along similar lines.”

“But those are low-probability events, wouldn’t you say?”

“A kilometer-scale asteroid impacting a planet a mere eleven days after our arrival there is also a very low-probability event, Counselor, even in a system as rich in asteroids as this. Yet
Titan
is currently responding to such an event. The improbable does occur.”

“That’s true.” Deanna considered her words. “But if you want to prepare them for anything, doesn’t that suggest using a wide range of different training exercises? Is there a reason you use the Borg simulation so often?”

Tuvok sighed. “You seek to elicit an admission that I am exacting a form of symbolic revenge against the Borg for the death of Elieth. I would point out, Counselor, that I am far from the only member of this crew to have lost family, friends, or colleagues to the Collective. I believe that the simulations can be cathartic for many members of my staff.”

“Interesting,” Deanna said—and the word was not merely the boilerplate “interesting” that therapists used to sound supportive. It genuinely was interesting that Tuvok had become comfortable enough with the idea of manag
ing rather than repressing emotion that he would use it as a factor in his training decisions, and that he would be empathetic enough to want to offer his subordinates such a catharsis. Still…“That may well be. But many members of this crew suffered post-traumatic stress in the wake of the invasion. Your Borg simulations are giving some people nightmares.”

She wanted to stand and walk around a bit to inject a pause in the conversation, gather her thoughts—hell, just to get the circulation back in her butt. But standing up would be such a time-consuming production that it would derail the conversation. “Tuvok, I’ve found that indulging anger doesn’t really relieve it—more often, it simply feeds it. If you—your personnel can’t be allowed to move past their rage toward the Borg, if they’re made to channel and express it over and over again, it just delays their recovery.”

He caught her in that no-nonsense gaze of his. “By which you implicitly mean my recovery as well.”

“Yes. But both are worth considering.”

For a time, the centenarian Vulcan pondered her words. “Perhaps I have…imposed my own needs too much on my personnel. I shall endeavor to refine my training to suit their needs better.”

“I’m sure they’ll appreciate it.”

He gave her the look she’d come to recognize as amusement. “Obviously you have never trained under me.”

But the moment was fleeting, and soon she felt the returning weight of his grief, his bitterness. “But what I choose to simulate in my own private training sessions…is my business, Counselor. Perhaps I am simply…not ready to let go yet.”

Unconsciously, Deanna wrapped her arms around her belly. She could feel the gaping wound in his soul where his youngest son had been, so much like the one in her own where her daughter’s unborn predecessor had lived for so tragically brief a time. She felt his frustration at his inability to protect his flesh and blood, and she understood it for reasons that had nothing to do with Betazoid senses. “Let go of what, Tuvok?” she asked. “Of futility? Of the desperate fantasy of going back and making it not happen? How do you hold on to Elieth’s memory by continuing to take revenge against an enemy that no longer exists?”

“Elieth’s last moments were spent defending against that enemy. His life was lost only because he chose to stay and defend others.”

“To help them evacuate—not to fight the Borg himself.”

“He defended in his way, as I do in mine. He gave away his life to confront the Borg. That is what I have left of him, Counselor.”

“He…gave
away
his life? Why that choice of words?”

“Federation Standard is an imprecise language. There are many ways to convey the same concept. Is this relevant?”

“Everything’s relevant in here, Tuvok.”

“No. You simply try to make it so.”

Hostility. Interesting.
It was an almost refreshing change from the grief. “Another thing about anger, Tuvok…sometimes you can’t let it go until you realize just who or what it is you’re angry with. When it’s displaced, it brings no satisfaction, no resolution.”

He stared, brows furrowing. “With whom or what would I be angry if not the Borg?”

“Well, who else made a choice that contributed to Elieth’s death?”

“The question is so broadly defined that there are countless possible answers. The admirals who failed to defend Deneva successfully. The Denevans who approved his employment there. Admiral Janeway for crippling the Borg’s transwarp network and triggering their mass retaliation. Captain Picard for choosing not to use the Endgame program to destroy the Borg thirteen years ago. There are many other possible answers to your question.”

Deanna shrugged. “We’ve still got half an hour. Let’s consider some.”

“Commander, we have a problem.”

Christine Vale suppressed a wince at the fluting observation from Ensign Kuu’iut, the lanky Betelgeusian who stood beta-shift tactical. She always hated to hear those words. “Don’t keep it to yourself, Ensign.”

“Close-range scans show the asteroid to consist of considerably denser materials than expected. Possibly large deposits of rodinium, diburnium, indurite. Its mass is sixty-eight percent greater than previously estimated.”

She sighed. “Making it sixty-eight percent harder to deflect. Or is it the square of that? I forget which.”

“One-half the mass times the velocity squared,” said Peya Fell, the Deltan woman at sciences. “Goes linearly with mass.”

“That’s something. Thanks, Ensign. Kuu’iut, can we still deflect it successfully?”

He shook his bald blue head, baring the sharp teeth in his lower eating mouth while responding through his beaklike speaking mouth. “Not by tractors alone. We’d burn out the emitters.”

“And blowing it up would just leave a bunch of smaller rocks heading on the same course. Would that be any better for the planet?”

“Not much. Same amount of kinetic energy delivered, just a bit more diffusely. And given its density, the surviving chunks might still be sizeable. It might actually endanger life across an even wider area of the ocean.”

Oh, great.
“Options?”

The ’Geusian leaned forward eagerly. It would be just like a member of his highly competitive culture, Vale thought, to see this as an entertaining challenge to pit himself against. “We could use phasers and torpedoes to vaporize a portion of the asteroid, creating explosive thrust that would push it off course, supplementing the tractor beams. We’d have to use the beams in pressor mode, pushing in the same direction as the thrust reaction.”

Vale nodded. “Do it.” She had almost regretted insisting that Tuvok keep his counseling appointment with Deanna rather than supervising the deflection as he’d requested, but Kuu’iut seemed to have the matter well in hand.

In moments, the Betelgeusian had the target coordinates computed and coordinated with Ooteshk at the conn, who moved
Titan
into position, reversing thrust until the ship was keeping station with the asteroid. “If my gamble pays off,” Kuu’iut said, “a phaser strike and two quantum torpedoes in that central fissure should blow off a fairly
large chunk or two, providing some extra reaction mass. I’m boosting shields in case of blowback.”

“We’re not here to gamble, Ensign,” Vale reminded him. “I want the surest thing you can give me.”

“Aye, ma’am,” the ’Geusian said, but he sounded like he was humoring her. “Engaging tractor beams in pressor mode.” On-screen, a false-color overlay made the beams visible, a tight cone of lavender rays extending to make contact with the asteroid. Vale idly wondered why Starfleet imaging technicians generally chose blue or purple shades to represent gravitational phenomena.

“Deflection…point oh six arcseconds per minute,” Ensign Fell reported after a moment. “Point oh eight,” a few moments later.

“That’s below projections,” Kuu’iut said, “even accounting for its density.”

“Beam status?” Vale asked.

“Full power is being delivered. But it’s not having its full effect.”

“Boost tractor power to compensate. How long can the emitters run at overload?”

Kuu’iut’s clawed fingers danced across the console as he replied. “At this level, thirty-eight minutes. It should be sufficient.”

“Deflection rate rising to…point one two,” Fell reported in an incongruously seductive lilt.

“Still below projections.”

“Internal temperature and radiation readings beginning to rise,” the Deltan went on. “Something may be absorbing some of the beam energy, transforming it into radiant energy rather than kinetic.”

“Something like?”

Fell tilted her smooth, elegantly contoured head.
Bald,
Vale thought in passing.
There’s a look I haven’t tried.
“Readings could be consistent with sarium or yurium.”

Vale recognized them as elements that could store and channel energy. “Could that affect the use of phasers, Kuu’iut?”

“Not materially. As long as I boost the power as with the tractors.”

She turned to Tasanee Panyarachun at the engineering console. “Have engineering stand by to deliver extra power, if needed.”

“Aye, ma’am,” the dainty Thai woman answered.

“Phasers and torpedoes ready,” Kuu’iut said. “We’re in the window, ma’am.”

Vale gave a curt nod. “Fire.”

A red beam lashed out, another enhanced image, though less so than the tractors. It struck the fissure perfectly, and a cloud of vaporized rock erupted around the impact site. Two bright torpedoes followed it a moment later, detonating inside the pit the phasers had carved. There was no sign of the chunk breaking off as Kuu’iut had predicted. “Temp and radiation spiking!” Fell called after a moment. “Some kind of internal surge—”

“Feedback pulse along the tractor beam!” Panyarachun cried.

Kuu’iut’s corvine cry almost drowned her out: “Detonation! Brace for impact!”

Vale raced to the command chair to strap herself in as power surges ripped through the ship, jumping breakers, blowing circuits. The lights flickered and died, and the
consoles danced with St. Elmo’s fire, though luckily the new-generation wave guides woven into the material channeled the energies through the walls and away from the crew. But that was small comfort when
Titan
rocked under a chain of rapid-fire collisions, hitting so hard it felt like the whole asteroid had struck the ship. Vale was sent flying before she reached the chair.