2 Ghost Ship by Diane Carey

Author:Diane Carey [Carey, Diane]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: General, Fiction, Science fiction; American, Science Fiction, Space Opera, Star Trek fiction, Interplanetary voyages, Picard; Jean Luc (Fictitious character), Media Tie-In
ISBN: 9780671665791
Publisher: Pocket Books
Published: 1988-07-14T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seven

PICARD STOOD HIS battle bridge as though it were a chariot. In his hands he held the reins of chargers, in his eyes the image of the enemy.

Even to Riker, who himself was a tree trunk of a man, Picard suddenly seemed larger than life. Every ship had its no-win scenario; this was theirs. Despite the primitive programming of that thing out there, it was very efficient and it had them cold. They were going to have to deal with it; there was no getting away.

It filled the screen now, leaving no black edges, a wall of fulmination and color, just the kind of thing a mother tells her children never to touch, never even to think of touching. The stardrive section aimed its great cobra's head for that wall and jammed forward at all the speed she could muster. And even warp three-warp anything-was impressive and terrifying enough for anyone in his right mind.

In the last few seconds, Riker closed his eyes. He had to, to accept the fact that he was about to die to save the others. That was his unspoken duty, he knew; it was why the ship separated at all-when push came to shove, the stardrive section was expendable. They were supposed to sacrifice themselves, to step in front of the bullet. This was the whole idea.

His thick body tightened. He'd tasted the metallic flavor of the thing's attack before and now—

Enterprise crashed into the electrical wall at dead center, and erupted into pyrotechnics with a deafening crack. Voltage snapped throughout the ship, accosting every panel, every living body, a terrible concussion after concussion. Spasms racked through, each one accompanied by a blitz of senseless lights. Riker heard Deanna shriek as it focused on her, but he couldn't even turn around, couldn't even look.

Crack ... CRAAAAAACK ...

And the ship burst out the other side-a shaken vessel, filled with shaken people, sucking a tail of spectral fire after it.

"LaForge, veer into the asteroids! Engineering, this is Picard-"

How could he talk? How could he still be getting sound up out of his throat?

Riker tried to turn again, this time toward the captain, and this time he managed it. Picard was crouching against his command chair, one elbow locked over the chair's arm, shouting into the intercom. "Engineering! Emergency antimatter dump on my mark-do you copy!"

"Engineering ... uh, we copy ... ready when-"

"LaForge, are we in those asteroids yet?"

Trying to push his hands through a snapping electrical field that still swirled around his panel, LaForge pecked the course into the helm. Each time he pecked, his fingers were assaulted by the churning voltage, but he kept on until the ship was driving itself into the dirty trail of preplanetary garbage between the gas giant and the star.

Through a glittering cloud that filled the bridge from bulkhead to bulkhead and ceiling to floor, Riker strained to see Picard and beyond him, Deanna.

She was crouching too, both hands holding on to the bridge rail, her face turned toward one arm as though to shield her eyes and perhaps much more of herself.

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