Star Trek: The Next Generation - 119 - Armageddon's Arrow (9 page)

“That’s my fault, Lieutenant,” he said. “I didn’t expect it to happen as fast or go as far as it did, or else I would’ve warned you beforehand. With that sequence you activated, you should be seeing most of the stations up there coming online.”

“They’re back, all right,”
Chen said.
“It’s like what happened before. The tactical scanners are cycling through a whole process to ascertain the ship’s current position and whether there are any threats. They’ve once again registered the
Enterprise
as a vessel within the defensive system’s predetermined protective sphere, identity unknown and possibly dangerous, but I’m not seeing anything that indicates weapons or shields are being activated
.
”

La Forge nodded. So far, his plan for bringing up the various systems was proceeding without any problems. “We’ve found a way to keep those systems out of commission for the time being. We don’t need a repeat of what happened before, and we sure as hell don’t want that particle cannon turning itself on.”

“Good thinking
,
”
replied Chen.

Studying the array of status monitors on the closest of the five workstations positioned around the central tower, La Forge nodded in approval. “I think we’re done pushing buttons for the time being. Lieutenant Elfiki, take a scan of the workstations up there, but don’t touch anything else. I want to see what kind of data they’re accessing, and compare it to what’s going on down here.”

“Aye, sir
,
”
replied the science officer.
“Elfiki out
.
”

The connection was broken, leaving Worf and La Forge to continue their inspection of the alien systems. Peeking and peering into the compartment’s every nook and cranny had been an eye-opening experience for the chief engineer, to say the least. The area of the room in which they stood, which in reality was little more than a section of deck plating mounted on a support frame above the main floor and accessible via a trio of slender ladders, looked to be the main point from which engineers and other mechanical specialists oversaw the ship’s various systems. The chamber itself was spacious, essentially a massive tube dominated by the cylindrical structure occupying its center. La Forge knew that the conduit was itself a protective shell encasing the power plant for the primary particle weapon, which like the hull of the ship itself seemed impervious to his tricorder scans.

“Without tearing this thing apart, we’re not going to get a good look inside,” he said. “Until then, I have no idea how it was built, or what materials they used, nothing.” Turning to face the collections of workstations, La Forge blew out his breath. “This setup is brilliant. Whoever designed these interfaces knew what they were doing. The computer’s doing all the heavy lifting behind the scenes, but you can control to what extent from any one of these stations. If sections of the ship are cut off for whatever reason, the crew’s not stuck having to figure out workarounds. It’s really something.”

“What if the computer fails?” Worf asked.

“There’s a backup,” La Forge said, pointing to one of the monitors. “A protected archive that’s identical to the one currently running the show. It’s updated at regular intervals with the latest information from every onboard system, but it’s a one-way transaction. The secondary core is shielded against attack or disruption as a consequence of being linked to the main system. Even if the entire computer network crashed, the backup can be in place and running everything in a matter of hours.”

Worf grunted, folding his arms across his broad chest. “And what if
that
system fails?”

“Then I figure the crew has a hell of a lot more to worry about,” replied the chief engineer. “Still, for all the effort they put into the computer and automation systems, the ship itself still took quite a beating from somebody.” For the second time since he and Worf had entered the massive engineering area, La Forge looked at the console monitors which were providing a current list of damage assessments as collated by the ship’s computer. “Their warp drive, such as it is, is offline, as are a few of their shield generators and weapons systems, but most of it looks like it can be repaired without too much trouble. There are also a lot of non-critical systems which suffered damage to one degree or another.” He gestured toward one of the other monitors. “And then there’s this.”

Depicted on the screen was a computer-generated schematic of a power-generating mechanism that shared some similarities to the alien ship’s warp core, though it had taken La Forge time to confirm that despite the tremendous energies it appeared capable of producing, the engine was not linked to anything resembling a propulsion system.

“My tricorder shows that this thing has the largest concentration of residual chronitons on the entire ship. I have absolutely no idea how it’s supposed to work, but I’ve seen enough to convince me this is a temporal displacement device.” A few of the lingering energy signatures reminded him of what he had scanned more than a decade earlier from the Borg ship which the
Enterprise
had chased through time to twenty-first-century Earth. He had compiled enough information during that encounter to aid him in re-creating what the Borg sphere had done, allowing the starship to return to its own time. Agents from the Department of Temporal Investigations had interviewed him for nearly two full days following that incident, anxious to know everything he had learned and whether the technique La Forge had improvised could easily be repeated. Though the data he had collected had been stricken from the
Enterprise
’s main computer and deemed classified by Starfleet, he remembered enough that he was confident he could—in a pinch—re-create the process.

Not that I’m in any hurry to do that.

Worf, ever the skeptic, scowled as he studied the screen. “Does it still work?”

Shrugging, the engineer replied, “I guess the only real way to know would be to fire it up and see where it takes us. Want me to do that?”

“I would rather you didn’t. That never seems to work out very well.”

La Forge smirked. “Yeah, tell me about it. If I’m reading these diagnostics correctly, this thing is dead. Whatever damage was inflicted on the ship just prior to its jump resulted in a series of power spikes and cascading failures. A number of systems were fried, and I’m not picking up any power readings leading to or from this component. The computer’s logged several areas of critical damage that would have to be addressed before we could even attempt to reactivate it.” Tapping the screen, he added, “It could take weeks or months for us to get that far.”

“We need to inform the captain about this,” Worf said. “If this
is
from the future, then it’s a possible danger to the timeline.”

“Yeah,” La Forge replied, nodding in agreement. He was certain that Captain Picard would order no action taken against the supposed time travel engine, or whatever the hell this ship harbored. Instead, he would send a report back to Starfleet Command and the Department of Temporal Investigations and request their counsel. However, the
Enterprise
was a long way from home or help, which of course begged another question.

“If this is some kind of time ship,” La Forge said, “don’t you think somebody would come looking for it? Or maybe they already did, or will, but years in the future? Maybe they’re already here? Or, what if our coming aboard the ship and poking around has already done something to change future history?”

“You enjoyed the temporal mechanics courses at the Academy,” Worf replied. It was not a question.

Smiling, La Forge nodded. “Oh, yes.”

Before the Klingon could respond, monitors on the workstation flared to life, and indicators began flashing in hectic sequences. Streams of telemetry rendered in the still mostly untranslated text began a horizontal scroll across the different screens.

“What the hell?”asked La Forge, leaning to either side of the console tower to see that the same information appeared to be broadcasting on the adjacent workstations. “Something’s got this thing’s attention.”

Worf pointed to one of the screens. “This is an indication similar to what was displayed when the tactical system detected the
Enterprise
.”

“Yeah,” the engineer said, “but I canceled that alert.” Then his communicator chirped.

“Chen to Commander La Forge! The defensive systems are coming online, on their own!”

Stepping closer to the console, Worf glowered at the collection of monitors. “I thought you said those processes were deactivated.”

“This is my fault, sir!”
replied Chen.
“We thought we’d found an override for one of the other protected systems, but I must’ve entered the code wrong, because it looks like the computer’s invoking some kind of override. I don’t know, maybe there’s another security code or something else that’s needed that we don’t have.”

La Forge, studying the new readings, felt his pulse beginning to race and anxiety welling up within him. “Damn it. Whatever caused it, this thing is getting ready for a fight.”

9

Picard emerged from his ready room onto the
Enterprise
bridge, directing his gaze to the main viewscreen and the image of the alien vessel displayed upon it. Although the red alert signal which had sounded mere seconds earlier had already been muted, silent alarms continued to flash at different consoles. To a person, each of the crew members on duty were hunched over their workstations, hands moving at a rapid pace across their instruments.

“Report.”

Lieutenant Šmrhová, standing at the tactical station, replied, “Its weapons and defensive shields have come online again, sir. Our shields are up.”

“The onboard computer has activated some sort of secondary protocol,”
said Worf over the open communications channel.
“Commander La Forge believed he had disabled the tactical systems, but an override process has been triggered. We are attempting to deactivate it
.
”

Šmrhová called out, “Captain! We’re being targeted!”

The warning was all she had the chance to utter before the ship was rocked by an unseen impact. The deck trembled beneath Picard’s feet despite artificial gravity and inertial damping systems, and he was forced to steady himself by gripping the back of the ops officer’s chair.

“Faur, evasive course,” he ordered, but the young flight controller was already entering the necessary commands to her console, and on the main viewscreen the image of the alien ship rolled toward the display’s upper right corner as the
Enterprise
began maneuvering away from it. Despite quick reaction from Lieutenant Faur, the starship shuddered once more around them as the
Enterprise
’s deflector shields absorbed another attack.

“Shields down to seventy-eight percent,” Šmrhová said.

Pushing himself away from the ops station and back to his own seat, Picard said, “Keep us facing the ship and divert power from the rear shields forward as we pull back.” He dropped into the command chair, scanning the compact status displays set into its arms and noting the rapid stream of data as damage reports began arriving.

“Can you disable the weapons ports without risk to the away team?”

Šmrhová replied, “I’m not sure, sir.”

“Captain!”
shouted La Forge.
“The primary weapon’s been activated. Its power-up sequence is slower, but you don’t want to be here when it’s ready to fire.”
The chief engineer’s report was punctuated by a third strike against the shields, followed within seconds by another attack. With each new barrage, Picard felt the ship tremble with increasing intensity, and he knew that its defenses would not withstand prolonged abuse.

“Shields down to fifty-two percent,” Šmrhová said. “We’re being targeted by multiple ports, Captain.”

“Lock phasers on those weapons and return fire.”

Wasting no time, Šmrhová unleashed a barrage of phaser volleys, each shot aimed with pinpoint precision thanks to the aid of the
Enterprise
’s fire control systems. On the viewscreen, the alien ship was visible once again, now a target as the phaser strikes impacted against its own defensive screens.

“Their shields aren’t as good as ours,” Šmrhová said, “but they’re still hampering our counterattacks.”

“Continue firing.” Picard gripped the arms of his chair, bracing himself as yet another attack plowed into the shields. Now the overhead lighting around the bridge was wavering in tandem with the strikes. “Give us some maneuvering room, Faur. Šmrhová, tell engineering to route power from all non-essential systems to the shields.” Raising his voice for the benefit of the intercom, he added, “Commander La Forge, find a way to disable those systems.”

“Working on it, Captain!”

Another pair of volleys rammed the shields, accompanied by a new alarm wailing for attention. It was quickly silenced, but Picard knew the cause even before Šmrhová offered a report.

“Shields are down!”

Left with no choice, Picard ordered, “Faur, get us out of here.”

“Their shields are down, sir,” Šmrhová reported, “and three of the weapons ports are destroyed. There’s a gap in their field of fire we can use.”

“Feed that information to the conn, and continue targeting the ports in proximity,” Picard said, with no small amount of relief. “Mister La Forge, is that ship able to maneuver?”

The chief engineer replied,
“Negative. Its shields are still offline, but I can’t rule out the computer pulling another trick out of its hat.”

“You can thank Lieutenant Šmrhová for that,” said Picard. “Pull out whatever you have to, Geordi, but I want that ship immobilized.”

“On it, sir
.
”

Rising from his chair, Picard stepped forward until he stood between Lieutenant Faur and Glinn Ravel Dygan at the ops station. “Damage reports?”

“Still coming in,” Šmrhová said. “So far, it’s mostly overloads, but our shield generators took the brunt of it. Commander Taurik is inspecting the damage now.” She paused, checking other readings on her console, before adding, “The alien ship’s stopped firing, sir.”

“Mister La Forge?” Picard prompted.

“I think we got it, Captain,”
replied the engineer.
“The computer’s still active, but I was able to find a lockout for the tactical systems. We had to feed it a fake security code, something the crew likely would have to do
.
”

To Picard’s surprise, T’Ryssa Chen’s voice came on the line.
“I’m the one who’s responsible, sir. When I started activating various systems, the computer interpreted it as someone attempting an unauthorized access—which we were doing, really—and instituted protective measures. Nothing like that appeared on any of our scans or searches of the computer’s database. All I can figure is that they’re buried in one of the files we haven’t decrypted yet.”
There was a pause, and when Chen spoke again her voice was tinged with guilt.
“I’m sorry, sir.”

“Engineering is already addressing the damage,” Picard said.

La Forge said,
“I can be back there in fifteen minutes to start on the repairs.”

“No,” the captain countered. “I want you to remain there until we’re certain that ship’s computer doesn’t have any other traps waiting to be triggered. Once that’s done, Mister Taurik can replace you over there.” Though he was irritated at what had just taken place, Picard found it difficult to fault La Forge or Chen. There simply were too many unknowns surrounding the mysterious derelict. Now that they had all seen what the vessel was capable of doing if left to its own devices, Picard was disinclined to leave anything to chance. “I know you’re trying to be careful, Geordi, but if it’s a choice between preserving what you find and letting it take some other course of action on its own, do whatever you must to keep that from happening.”

“Understood, sir. We’re holding off activating anything else until we get a complete picture over here. I’ve got Elfiki and Chen up on the bridge, continuing to work at decrypting the protected files, and Doctor Crusher and her team are examining the crew
.”

Picard released a small sigh. “That should keep us busy for a little while, I think.”

*   *   *

T’Ryssa Chen had hoped that immersing herself in work might soften her irritation, but as time passed
—
ten hours, four of them devoted to a restless and ultimately futile attempt at sleep
—
she realized her annoyance with herself showed no signs of ebbing.

“Damn it.”

Looking up from the console which had been the focal point of her attention since taking over for Commander La Forge after he returned to the
Enterprise
, Chen reached up to rub her temples. Even with the Vulcan aspects of her physiology, she was starting to feel the effects of the long hours spent here aboard the derelict, her lack of sleep, and the stresses of dealing with the unfamiliar systems. How long had she been here today, anyway? A glance to the chronometer on her tricorder told her that she and the rest of the away team had been here for nearly five hours on this, their second day investigating the alien ship.

“Are you all right, Lieutenant?”

Even Worf’s deep voice was muted by the omnipresent hum of the alien ship’s massive power plant. Turning from the console, Chen looked up to see the
Enterprise
’s first officer regarding her with concern—the Klingon equivalent of concern, anyway.

“I’m just tired, sir,” she replied. She leaned back in the curved seat which, despite its odd construction, was rather comfortable. “I’ve been staring at these screens too long.”

“Perhaps,” Worf said, “but that is not all. You are still angry with yourself.”

Chen nodded. “Oh, yeah. I’ll probably be angry with myself for a while yet.”

“You blame yourself for the attack on the
Enterprise
.”

“Damned right I do.” Chen paused, blowing out her breath. “I’m sorry, sir. It’s just that I’m the one who decided to start poking around with the computer, instead of following Commander La Forge’s lead and restoring systems in the order he was using. I figured we could help Doctor Crusher to revive the crew, and learn something about how this ship was put together. I know I didn’t press the buttons that fired those weapons, but I obviously did something wrong, and the computer reacted to my tinkering around just the way it was supposed to. It acted to protect the ship from intrusion. It protected itself from
us
.”

Crossing his arms, Worf stood like a statue, studying her with his typical implaccable expression. “Is there anything you did that should have alerted you to the potential for trouble?”

“Based on the readings we were getting?” Chen rubbed the bridge of her nose. “I honestly don’t see how, but that doesn’t mean I couldn’t. It just means that I
didn’t
.”

The price for her not seeing the potential trouble could have been much higher than what already had been paid. Her imagination had been taunting her with what might have happened had the brief yet intense skirmish managed to inflict greater harm to the
Enterprise
. What if someone had died? How would she have been able to face Captain Picard and her shipmates, or even look at herself in a mirror?

Thankfully, the damage was minor, if widespread. Upon returning to the
Enterprise
after judging that the mysterious ship’s computer system posed no new danger, Commander La Forge had gone straight to engineering to find that repairs were well under way and proceeding at a steady pace ahead of even his assistant chief engineer’s estimates. The starship’s damaged deflector shield generators remained the most daunting task, but even those were expected to be restored to full operational capabilities before the start of the next duty shift. Despite her own intention to pitch in for the remainder of the work, Chen had been overruled—albeit in gentle fashion—by Worf, with the first officer directing her to her quarters for a mandatory rest period before returning to the alien vessel. Despite the Klingon’s directive, she had lain awake in her bed, staring up at the overhead and contemplating her role in the events of the past hours.

Incompetent
and
useless. Not bad for day’s work
.

“I was here with Commander La Forge when you interfaced with the computer,” Worf said, “and I saw nothing you did that was wilfully negligent. Neither did Commander La Forge, or Lieutenant Elfiki or anyone else.”

The words did little to assuage Chen’s feelings. “I know I shouldn’t be beating myself up about this, sir, at least not this much.” She shook her head. “It took me a long time to realize that I’m happy on the
Enterprise
, and I really don’t want to be anywhere else, or doing anything else. And then, there I am, standing there while my ship and all the people I care about are being shot at by weapons I helped activate.” Sensing Worf preparing to respond, she held up her hand. “I know, sir. I didn’t actually do that, but come on. It’s a matter of semantics, right?” She sighed. “I just feel like I let Captain Picard down. Hell, I feel like I let everyone down.”

Worf said nothing, though his gaze did not shift from her, and after a moment she was beginning to feel uneasy. Then, finally, he broke the silence.

“Do you remember when you were first assigned to the
Enterpris
e
?”

“Like it was yesterday.” There were times when Chen marveled at just how much time had passed since her arrival aboard the Federation flagship, itself a premiere, coveted posting by junior officers throughout Starfleet. The starship carried with it a history and pedigree that was required reading at the Academy. Even before that, its name had been the source of stories and even legends dating back centuries, to well before humans had launched themselves to the stars but instead traversed the oceans of the world they called home.

“Do you remember what I told you with respect to learning?” Worf asked.

Chen smiled. “Yes, sir. You said to never be afraid of making a mistake. Instead, we should learn from it, and never make the same mistake twice.”