Star Trek: Corp of Engineers - 066 - What's Past 6 - Many Splendors by Keith R. A. Decandido

Author:Keith R. A. Decandido [Decandido, Keith R. A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, General, Science Fiction, Space Opera, Adventure
ISBN: 9781416533078
Google: xUAksqR7oGMC
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Published: 2006-01-02T08:00:00+00:00

When they arrived in Ten-Forward, the “corner office” already had an Earl Grey tea, a green tea, a synthehol Scotch, a birch beer, a synthehol bitters, and a raktajino sitting in front of each place.

Lian raised her green tea as they all took a seat and said, “To Ensigns Gomez, Costa, Van Mayter, and Russell for earning commendations on the Hathaway!”

“Here, here,” Tess Allenby said, hoisting her Scotch. She and Lian were the only ones from the corner office who hadn’t been assigned to Captain Riker, though they had been sent to the battle bridge after the Ferengi attacked, in case the Enterprise needed to do an emergency saucer separation.

They all sipped from their drinks and cheered. “You all did amazing work,” Lian said. “Everybody’s talking about it.”

Denny shrugged as he swallowed his birch beer. “Just another day at the office.”

“C’mon,” Tess said, “doing what you did with an eighty-year-old ship? I’m amazed the thing didn’t fall apart when you blew on it.”

“Don’t be so sure,” Helga said. “Those old systems’ll surprise you—right, Sonya?”

Grinning at her Earl Grey, Sonya said, “Yeah, okay, so I took a little while to get the hang of it.”

“More than a little while,” Helga said conspiratorially.

“All right, all right, more than a little while. But we did it, didn’t we? We made a warp drive and we beat the Ferengi.”

Gar held his raktajino near his face, as if ready to sip it at a moment’s notice. “We made a warp drive with spit and baling wire.”

“And the Crusher kid’s experiment,” Helga added.

Tess made a face. “Not that little twerp again.”

Sonya was surprised by the vehemence of her reaction. “Tess?”

“Look, Sonya, I know he’s your friend, but…I mean, c’mon, he’s a kid. He hasn’t taken one class at the Academy, and Picard’s got him doing alpha-shift conn duties. I’m never gonna get on the bridge during alpha as long as he’s on the ship, especially if he keeps pulling miracles like this.”

“Tess, I…” Sonya hesitated. She’d really grown to like Wes over the past few months, but she hadn’t realized that the “acting ensign’s” position might have had a deleterious effect on the not-so-acting ensigns.

“Look, it’s okay.”

“You should say something to Riker,” Helga said. “He’s a good guy.”

“Please—he’s the one in charge of the kid’s ‘education.’ Who do you think put him in charge of that mineral survey in Drema? The worst thing I can do is complain to Riker about his precious boy genius.”

An uncomfortable silence descended over the corner office for a second before Gar said, “Hey, I hear La Forge is doing rotations again. He’s putting Kieran on warp diagnostics.” He waggled his eyebrows at Sonya. “So now you two can flirt all shift.”

Sonya almost spit her tea. “What?”

Lian gave Sonya an accusatory look. “Flirting? With Lieutenant Duffy? Sonya, you didn’t tell me.”

“We are not flirting.”

“Coulda fooled me,” Denny muttered.

“Don’t you start,” she said with a glower at her classmate.

“Hey, I wasn’t the one giggling during the maintenance cycle.”

Tess shot her a look. “Giggling?”

“He—” Sonya sighed.

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