“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. “He told a funny joke. The law of averages was bound to catch up to him eventually, and he’d say something funny. I was just being polite.”

  “During a maintenance cycle,” Denny deadpanned.

  “Look—”

  “And then there was that time during the Mariposa mission,” Gar said.

  “And when you two were on the damage-control team when that old Klingon ship attacked,” Helga added.

  “And when—”

  “All right!” Sonya said, interrupting Denny. “Maybe we are flirting…a little.”

  “For very large values of ‘little,’” Denny muttered.

  “But that’s all it is. I’m not interested in Kieran Duffy. He’s not nearly as funny as he thinks he is—in fact, nobody’s as funny as he thinks he is—and besides, he’s still a j.g. He’s been in Starfleet for years, and that’s as far as he’s gotten. That’s a classic case of career dead-endedness.”

  “So?” Lian asked.

  Sonya hesitated. She stared at Lian for a second. All her reasons were true, of course, but that wasn’t the overriding factor. She had, over the past months, taken it easy, and allowed herself to have a social life.

  But she hadn’t taken the next step with Kieran Duffy for one simple reason: she didn’t want to go through what Lian went through when the Borg attack took Soon-Tek from her.

  Tess used Sonya’s mention of career dead-endedness to rant about Wesley again, which in turn led to Denny speculating about his parents, which led to Lian and Helga telling Sonya, Denny, and Tess about Beverly Crusher, which led to a discussion of Dr. Pulaski and her transporter phobia, and soon nobody was talking about Tess’s bitterness or Sonya’s love life, which suited Sonya just fine.

  CHAPTER

  6

  Captain’s log, stardate 43198.7. The Enterprise remains in standard orbit while we investigate the tragedy which has struck the away team. Lieutenant Marla Aster, ship’s archeaologist, has been killed in what should have been a routine mission. Whatever the explanation, it will not bring back a valued and trusted officer.

  “Hey, Sonya, wait up!”

  Sonya paused to let Kieran catch up with her in the deck ten corridor. She was heading to the turbolift, and thence to engineering. Both were on beta shift now—they’d been assigned there for the past few weeks, ever since their encounter with the Shelliak—which started in a few minutes. She’d been grabbing a bite to eat in Ten-Forward and reading a fascinating article in the latest JAWM about soliton waves. “What’s up, Kieran?”

  “You’ve been holding out on me, Ensign.”

  Frowning, Sonya said, “I don’t know what you mean.” Then she added with a smile, “Lieutenant.”

  He grinned back at her. “I mean you never told me Belinda Gomez was your sister.”

  “It’s not like it’s a secret or anything.” Sonya tried not to sound defensive. The fact of the matter was, she had kept it a secret. She had enough of dealing with being in the shadow of Her Sister the Soccer Star for most of her teen years, through to her time at the Academy. “You never asked.”

  “Oh, okay. I’ll remember that from now on when I meet people. ‘Say, you don’t happen to have any famous siblings or other relatives?’ I mean, c’mon, Sonya, it’s not like most people would keep that a secret. She’s a great player.”

  “I know, I just—” She sighed. “I spent a lot of time being in her shadow, that’s all. You know she saved my life when we were kids? I fell into the Gulf of Mexico when we were out on a rowboat, and she dived in and kept me from drowning.” Sonya shook her head. “That was just the start. After that, it was always, ‘why can’t you be like your sister?’”

  “You should invite her on the ship, then. You’ll eclipse her in a nanosecond.”

  Sonya gave Kieran a dubious look. “C’mon. I’m just an engineer.”

  “‘Just’ an engineer? Kiddo, you’ve been Geordi’s golden girl for months. Besides, who else would have the chutzpah to spill hot chocolate on a god?”

  At that, Sonya couldn’t help but laugh. Just recently, the natives of Mintaka III had mistaken the captain for a deity. It had taken a certain amount of work—and a near-fatal injury to Picard—to convince the Mintakans that the Enterprise captain was not divine.

  “It’s not that big a deal,” she said as they approached the turbolift. “She’s just my sister.”

  “Hah. There’s no such thing as ‘just’ a sister. I’ve got one, too, y’know—Amy. Devoted her life to making mine a living hell. Why do you think I signed up for Starfleet? Gets me far away from her and her practical jokes.”

  They stood and waited for a turbolift. “Since when do you have a problem with practical jokes?” Sonya in particular was recalling an incident involving Ensigns McKnight and Prixis that required a molecular debonder to be applied in sickbay to their hair. The joke around the ship was that it was that incident in particular that led to Dr. Pulaski transferring off the Enterprise.

  “I have no problem with my practical jokes. It’s hers that are the issue. There was this one time—”

  The doors opened to reveal La Forge. Right around the time Pulaski left—to be replaced by the woman she replaced, Beverly Crusher, Wesley’s mother—La Forge had been promoted to lieutenant commander. According to what both Kieran and Denny had heard, La Forge had had several of his personnel requests denied because the people he wanted were full lieutenants, and Starfleet wasn’t comfortable with a chief engineer not being the senior-ranked person in the engine room. La Forge expressed his frustration to Riker, Riker expressed it to Picard, and the captain gave La Forge a field promotion to lieutenant commander after only a year as a full lieutenant.

  “Duffy, just the man I want to see. You need to come with me to the transporter.”

  “What’s happening?” Sonya asked.

  “The away team got into a scrape—a bomb went off.”

  Sonya’s stomach fell. “Is everyone okay?” She knew that Worf was leading the team, which also included one civilian scientist who was on loan to Starfleet, and two archeaologists, Marla Aster and Leo Antonidas.

  La Forge shook his head. “Lieutenant Aster didn’t make it.”

  Kieran’s eyes went wide. “Oh my God.”

  “Commander Riker wants us to go down there, figure out what happened. Ensign Gomez, report to engineering—you’re in charge till I get back.”

  That surprised Sonya. She guessed that all the junior-grade lieutenants on beta shift were going on the team. “Yes, sir.”

  “Duffy?” They proceeded to the forward turbolift that would take them to the transporter.

  Sonya shivered as she stepped onto the lift. She didn’t really know Marla Aster that well, but she did know that she was a single mother, and had a son on board the ship. What’ll happen to him?

  Beta shift had been tense and unpleasant. It was one thing when people died in battle, as they did against the Borg, but stupid accidents like this didn’t sit right with anyone. Sonya found herself reminded of the conversation she’d had with Kieran about Captain Schönhertz and space being mean and/or indifferent.

  After the shift ended, she went to Ten-Forward, and found Kieran nursing an ale. She asked Guinan for a tequila, and then went over to Kieran’s table. “That’s not hot chocolate, is it?”

  Seemingly despite himself, Kieran laughed. “No, it’s ale.”

  “Mind if I join you?”

  “Never.” Kieran said the word rather emphatically.

  Sonya took a seat. Guinan brought the tequila over. She held it up and gave the toast that they had told her at the Academy was traditional when comrades were lost in battle. “Absent friends.”

  “Yeah.”

  They both drank.

  “You knew her, didn’t you?” Sonya asked.

  Kieran nodded. “We met right after she came on board about eighteen months ago. She was having some kind of problem with the replicator in her cabin—wouldn’t give her kid his favorite drink, which was this vile fruit concoction. So I fixed it, and we got to talking—even went on a date or two. Nothing really materialized, though. I don’t think she was entirely over her husband, y’know?”

  Sonya nodded, though she, in fact, didn’t know. She’d never lost anyone closer to her than three grandparents she barely knew.

  “Still, she was a great lady. And Jeremy’s a really good kid. God, I don’t know what’s gonna happen to him.”

  “What was she like?”

  Kieran spent the next half hour or so telling Sonya various and sundry facts about Lieutenant Marla Aster, from her proclivity for pink clothing while off duty to her ability to talk for several hours at a time on the subject of the amazing discoveries on Jureosa to her courtship with her husband when they were both studying at Endurance University on Mars.

  The recollections were interrupted by La Forge’s voice on the intercom. “Lieutenant Duffy, Ensign Gomez, report to main engineering.”

  They exchanged quick glances, gulped down the rest of their drinks, and headed out. “Wonder what’s up,” Kieran said. “And hey, Sonya—thanks.”

  As they approached the turbolift, Sonya smiled up at him. “No problem, Kieran. You were there for me when I was moping in Ten-Forward after the Borg. Seemed only fair to return the favor.”

  “Yeah.”

  CHAPTER

  7

  Captain’s log, stardate 43489.2. We have arrived at Angosia III, a planet that has expressed a strong desire for membership in the Federation. Prime Minister Nayrok has taken Commander Riker and me on a tour of the capital city.

  “Garfield Costa, step forward.”

  Next to Sonya, Gar took a single step forward. They were in formation in engineering, along with Ensigns Kornblum, Russell, Sherman, and Van Mayter, facing Geordi La Forge and Data. Behind the chief engineer and the second officer were the rest of the engineering staff, most with big smiles on their faces. Several of them had already been promoted as well; Geordi had gone in reverse order of rank, ending with the ensigns who were making j.g.

  Data handed Geordi a box, which he opened to reveal a hollow pip. He stepped forward and affixed it to Gar’s collar. “I hereby promote you to the rank of junior-grade lieutenant, with all the duties and privileges that entails.”

  Gar nodded, beaming. “Thank you, sir.”

  He stepped back, and Geordi said, “Sonya Gomez, step forward.”

  Until he said those words, Sonya hadn’t been able to bring herself to believe that she was really being promoted. Indeed, ever since the infamous hot-chocolate incident, she’d been convinced that her collar would go without any more pips until she finally took the hint and resigned her commission and went into a line of work where she could do less damage.

  But after the Enterprise’s mission to the Romulan Neutral Zone ended, the promotion list came out, and Sonya was thrilled to see her name on it. Among other things, it meant she got a cabin to herself. Not that she had anything against Lian, but she hadn’t had a room to herself since she was seventeen.

  Besides, Lian’s name had also been on the promotion list, so she was getting a cabin of her own, too, where she said she intended to celebrate along with another new promotion, Lieutenant Tanaka, one of the medical technicians, whom she’d been seeing for a few weeks now.

  Ella Clancy had also been promoted; sadly, Tess Allenby wasn’t, which Sonya feared would simply make her friend even more bitter toward Wes. In fact, Tess was the only member of the corner office who remained an ensign.

  Kieran hadn’t been on the list, either, which meant that he and Sonya were now of the same rank. Sonya wasn’t sure how she felt about that.

  Sonya stood proudly as Geordi affixed the hollow pip to her collar. I can’t believe this is happening.

  “I hereby promote you to the rank of junior-grade lieutenant, with all the duties and privileges—”

  Feeling like she was going to explode, Sonya said, “Thank you, sir.” Then she realized what she’d done.

  Geordi, however, just shook his head and chuckled. “—that entails,” he finished. Everyone else laughed as well.

  To her amazement, Sonya didn’t feel embarrassed. She was too happy.

  Data and Geordi went down the line to the other engineering ensigns in alphabetical order, ending with Helga.

  Afterward, everyone in engineering cheered. Even Data, after a fashion.

  Turning to Lieutenant Della Guardia, Geordi said, “We’ve got to get to the bridge—you’re in charge, Alfredo.”

  “Yes, sir,” the newly promoted full lieutenant said.

  Data and Geordi departed. Sonya knew that Picard and Riker were going to be given a tour of the Angosian capital, so Data was in command of the ship, and Geordi liked to put in time on the bridge, she knew. She suspected that was a holdover from his time as the alpha-shift conn officer before he was given the chief job. If there was one thing she’d learned about Geordi in a year on the Enterprise, it was that he liked to be in the thick of things.

  Kieran walked up to her. “Congrats, Sonya. See, I told you. Watch it, inside a few years, you’ll be running this place, while I’ll just be an ordinary j.g.”

  “Don’t be so sure of that,” Alfredo Della Guardia said. “You got yourself a mighty fine performance review, there, Duff.”

  “I did?” Kieran sounded surprised.

  “He did?” Sonya sounded the same.

  “Hey!” Now Kieran was mock-outraged.

  Alfredo shrugged. “His work’s picked up. Maybe you’re a good influence on him.”

  With that, Alfredo walked away.

  Sonya wasn’t sure what to make of that.

  The festivities concluded, it was time to go back to work. With the promotion, Gomez was put in charge of the warp core, which had been Della Guardia’s responsibility. La Forge generally preferred to rotate folks, so they were experienced in all aspects of engineering, not just their individual specialty, but he said Sonya’s antimatter expertise would prove handy, especially since the Enterprise’s warp drive had gotten a lot more and varied use in the past couple of years than expected. The Galaxy-class was still a relatively new design, after all—though the Borg threat had sent Utopia Planitia into overdrive with new ship concepts—and could, Geordi said, use some hand-holding.

  As she ran a diagnostic on the warp core, she thought about Alfredo’s words. She hadn’t really seen herself as influencing Kieran in any way. True, they’d been spending more time together lately. She found she was enjoying his company more and more, in part because he seemed to be taking life more seriously.

  Or maybe it was that she was taking life less seriously. The promotion to j.g. had validated what Geordi, not to mention Ella, Lian, Kieran, Wes, and pretty much everyone else on board, had been saying for a year now: she deserved to be here. And she’d learned quite a bit—probably more in one year on this vessel than she had in four years at the Academy. She’d hot-wired an eighty-year-old impulse drive, helped outwit some alien kidnappers, done damage control against foes ranging from Borg to out-of-date Klingons to unknown aliens to a ten-thousand-year-old booby trap, and learned so much about different approaches to ship engineering.

  More important though, she had learned what Geordi had instructed her to learn: to relax.

  “General quarters. All off-duty and civilian personnel report to quarters immediately.”

  Sonya looked up sharply as she entered main engineering to report for her second day of duty as a lieutenant. The computer’s instruction didn’t apply to her, as she had just come on duty, but she wondered what had prompted it. Yesterday, the Enterprise had taken on an Angosian prisoner named Roga Danar, and this morning was transferring him back to a penal colony on one of Angosia’s moons. Sonya’s initial thought—What could possibly have gone wrong?—was immediately suppressed. A year on the U.S.S. Enterprise had wrested out of her the notion that nothing could go wrong almost as fast as the notion that there were things that didn’t have a solution.

  From transporter control, Cliff Meyers said, “I don’t believe this—Danar broke out of the transporter field!”

  “That’s not possible,” Kieran said.

  Geordi ran over to stand behind Cliff. “I’ve seen this guy in action, Duffy, don’t be so sure of that.”