"I am simply asking you to accept that all is not necessarily what it seems with the prisoner."
"Very well," Sela said impatiently. "Consider it a given. Putting that fact aside ... what about the things he did say. Was he telling the truth?"
"He certainly believed what he was saying. It was definitely the truth as he believed it. However, bis thoughts are finely tuned."
"Meaning what? That he's a telepath?"
"No. No, nothing quite that refined. But he has had training in mental disciplines that exceed anything Starfleet is currently
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offering. What it does mean is that if he had something he wished to keep hidden, he might very well be able to do so in such a way that nothing short of a deep probe would be able to dig it out."
"Can you do it?"
He shook his head. "Beyond my capabilities, I'm afraid. We have technology that could extract the information, but he might very well put up such a fight that whatever's left of him when we're through would be useless."
"We're going in circles here, Kressn," Sela said impatiently. "Give me your final assessment. Give me something I can work with."
"Very well. He is, without question, an angry and disillusioned man. He does not feel any particular attachment to Starfleet. If he feels anything for anyone, it would be for this Deanna person you mentioned. Your bringing her name up definitely provoked a mental spike from him. His feelings for her are exceedingly raw."
"Saket always told me that raw materials are the most useful, since they can be molded into so many different things," Sela said. She leaned back against her desk, stroking her chin thoughtfully. "Anything else?"
"Yes." Kressn cleared his throat and said, with what sounded like mild annoyance, "He finds you rather attractive."
"Does he?" She smirked at that. "Well, if there was any question as to whether he's really William Riker, that certainly resolved it. It was part of his psych profile when I first researched him: He considers himself quite the ladies' man. Apparently a number of ladies share that assessment."
"And would you be one of them?"
She looked at him, her gaze hardening. "You overstep yourself, Kressn."
He bowed slightly.
"These are different times, Kressn." She moved back around her desk. "Different times call for different measures. Tell me, Kressn ... if we brought William Riker into our plan, and it
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was he who was responsible for the death of an entire race . . . how do you think that would reflect on Starfleet and the Federation?"
"You do not need to ask me that," he told her mildly. "You already know the answer."
"Yesss," she smiled. "And I think it an option that we would most definitely be benefited in exploring. I think that William Riker and I will be able to be of tremendous use to one another."
"I have no doubt, Sela," Kressn said. "I have no doubt at all."
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CHAPTER
had wanted to surprise her mother, but that had proven somewhat problematic. The moment that she had arrived on the transport to Betazed, she had been spotted by a longtime friend of the family, Silvan, who relayed the information telepathically to another friend, and so on down the line. Betazoids for the most part had telepathy of limited range, but with the advent of something as momentus as Deanna Troi's return to Betazed, the news followed a brisk chain of telepathic ricochets so that the news arrived at Lwaxana Troi's doorstep within approximately forty-five seconds of Deanna's having set foot on her homeworld. As a consequence, Lwaxana had a good deal of time to prepare for her daughter's arrival.
Immediately she contacted 135 guests in preparation for a banquet to honor her daughter's visit. She also let several very eligible Betazoid bachelors be aware of the fact that her wayward daughter had returned and that she was, you know, not getting any younger. Certainly the passage of time had done nothing to diminish her daughter's good looks, fine figure, and other assets that-on the whole-made her a superb catch, and the fact that she had gone unsnagged for
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this long only worked in a gentleman's favor, because at this point Deanna must be starting to realize that time and matrimony wait for no one, not even a Daughter of the Fifth House. In short, there was every possibility that she might be a lot less choosy these days, and that was to everyone's advantage.
And, of course, anyone who married Deanna would have the deep honor of having the famed Lwaxana Troi for a mother-in-law.
As she broadcast this, Lwaxana had the strangest feeling. It was the sound, in her head, of telepathic doors slamming. She wasn't entirely sure why that would be, but she was willing to shrug it off as not being of very much consequence.
It should be noted that when Silvan sent out the original thought-cast about Lwaxana, he had noticed that Deanna seemed engaged in lively and pleasant conversation with what appeared to be a Klingon father and son traveling together. This in and of itself did not appear particularly significant, however, and as a result Silvan did not happen to pass that along in the message. This was a pity, as it might have given Lwaxana at least some measure of warning. As a result, she had none. So when she greeted her wandering daughter in the grand foyer of casa Troi, she was not at all prepared for what was about to happen.
Mr. Homn, Lwaxana's towering manservant, stepped to one side as Lwaxana almost stampeded over him to get to her daughter. "Little One!" she said out loud, knowing that for some bizarre reason Deanna found it extremely off-putting to speak purely through the mind. "Did you tell me you were coming? Did I forget?" She draped an arm around Deanna's shoulders and strolled with her into the main sitting room, tugging her as if she were afraid that Deanna was going to bolt at any moment. "I know, I know, I'm getting on in years. You might have told me that you were coming for a visit and I simply forgot."
"Mother, you know better than that," Deanna gently
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scolded her. "You forget nothing. Your mind is as sharp as it ever was."
Lwaxana laughed, sounding surprisingly girlish considering that her girlish years were long gone. "There are some people," she said, as if sharing a naughty secret, "who would say that that isn't much of a compliment."
"We pity those people," Deanna deadpanned.
"Mr. Homn, some tea ... Earl Gray, piping hot. Jean-Luc got me addicted to the stuff," she told Deanna, looking a bit embarrassed, "and now I just don't know what to do. It's not easy to come by here on Betazed, although I do have my methods and a rather long reach. Come, sit on the-"
Then Lwaxana suddenly stopped her cheerful burbling and stared at her daughter as if Deanna had grown a nose in the middle of her forehead. She folded her arms and, acquiring a slightly worried demeanor, said, "All right, Little One. What is it you're nervous about telling me?"
"Mother!" Deanna made no effort to hide her annoyance, not that it would have helped if she had tried. "You know I hate that! I hate when you skim the thoughts off the top of my mind! I want to tell you something, surprise you, and you won't even let me get to it in my own way and time."
"All right." Lwaxana looked as if she were making a physical effort to haul something unseen back into her head. "All right. Go ahead. Tell me."
"You . .. should be happy about it, actually," Deanna said. "Something's, well.. . something's come up, and I know that it's something that's been important to you for quite some time___"
Lwaxana clapped her hands together, her dark eyes going wide with excitement. "You're getting married!"
"Mother! For heaven's sake-!"
"I didn't peek!" Lwaxana drew herself up as if her honor were being questioned, squaring her shoulders and looking at her daughter as if daring her to try and accuse her otherwise. "Deanna, I'm not stupid. I figured it out from the things you
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r
just said! At least, I believe I did. Did I? Figure it out, I mean?"
At that, Deanna couldn't hold back a laugh. Lwaxana Troi was not exactly one of the mo
re staid individuals one could hope to meet, even under normal circumstances. Well, these circumstances were far from normal. Not wanting to keep her mother in suspense anymore, Deanna said, "Yes, Mother, you figured it out. I'm engaged to be married."
Lwaxana promptly slapped her lightly across the face.
Deanna was momentarily startled, and could feel a faint stinging sensation in her cheek, as much from surprise as anything else. But then Lwaxana immediately leaned forward and kissed the other cheek, and then Deanna remembered.
"The slap to remind you of the pain of married life," Lwaxana said, "and the kiss to remind you that, with love, all can be solved. Congratulations, Little One."
"Fortunately I remembered the tradition after you whacked me," Deanna said, rubbing the sore spot. "Next time give me a little bit of warning, though, all right?"
"Oh, don't complain. You're an engaged woman now, so don't whine about a little pain. So," and she took Deanna's hands in hers and sat them both on the luxurious couch. It was a bright orange with green diagonal stripes. Deanna had hated the couch since her youth. She'd once offered to buy it off her mother, just so she could man the transporter and disassemble the thing one molecule at a time. But her mother had been less than cooperative and wouldn't part with it. "So . . . have you and Riker set a date?"
"What?" asked Deanna in puzzlement.
"Riker. You and Will Riker. Your fiance. I know it's Riker; you were thinking of him when you told me you were engaged. Oh, I'm sorry, I know I shouldn't pry, but it's a bad habit I'm trying to kick. ..."
"Mother, I wasn't thinking about Will."
"Yes, you were. He was uppermost in your thoughts. . . ."
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"That's because I have other thoughts occupying the deeper layers."
Lwaxana seemed utterly confused. "Are you saying. .. you're not marrying Riker?"
"You sound disappointed. I didn't know you felt so strongly about him as a husband for me . .."
"Well, you are Imzadi, after all, and you've been together for all this time, and you hadn't written to me and told me that you'd gotten involved with someone new. ..."
"Mother, I'm not obligated to fill you in on it every time I'm 'involved with someone new,' am I?"
"No, of course not." Lwaxana regarded her with open curiosity. "Although now that we're on the subject, how many men have you been involved with over the past years?"
"None," Deanna deadpanned. "I've been with no men in all these years. In fact, I never even really had sex with Will, not ever. I am, in fact, a virgin."
"You certainly know what a mother wants to hear," Lwaxana told her, smiling, her eyes twinkling in amusement. "Seriously, Deanna... if not Riker, then who? Not Jean-Luc!" She suddenly seemed stunned.
"No, Mother."
"That nice engineering fellow with the large hair clip on his face?"
"His name is Geordi, it's called a VISOR, and no, it's not him."
"Well, I doubt it's the android. .. ." She paused a moment to glance at Deanna for confirmation as to this supposition. Deanna quietly shook her head. "Then who .. . ?" Suddenly she seemed aghast. "Deanna, don't tell me... not... a noncom?!?"
"Have no fear, Mother. You needn't worry about becoming an outcast in polite society. He's not a noncommissioned officer." She took a deep breath, and then said, "Actually, it's ... well... it's Worf."
Dead silence. Lwaxana just stared at her.
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"Worf Rozhenko. .. the security guard," Deanna prompted. "We sat in a mudbath together, remember?"
Still no reply.
"Has a young son named Alexander? Cute as a-"
Then Lwaxana started to laugh. This did not strike Deanna as being A Good Thing.
The laughter started out low and then began to grow, louder and louder, until she was shaking with such spasmodic contractions of her chest that Deanna was momentarily concerned that Lwaxana was literally going to die laughing. Only Lwaxana's formidable mental training was able to help her as she managed to pull herself together . . . unfortunately, only long enough for another peal of laughter to fill the mansion and, once more, it took time for her to recover her equilibrium.
"Oh, Deanna," she said at last, "you certainly know how to amuse your old mother. You and Mr. Woof. . . gods, child, for a moment there you had me going. Wheeww!" She sagged back in her chair, rubbing her ribs as if concerned that one might have snapped during her laughing fit.
"Mother, I'm not joking. . . ."
"No, of cooourse you're not." She patted Deanna affectionately on the arm.
"Mother, don't take that tone of voice with me. It's insulting to me. If you don't believe me, here," and suddenly she relaxed her guard, "let's just jump over the protests and the convincing and get right to it. Here. Look into my mind. Find out what you want, and then we'll talk."
Lwaxana didn't need a second invitation. Her body sagged a bit as she projected her formidable mind-reading abilities into Deanna's head. It took her only the briefest of moments to discern the information for which she was looking.
The moment she did, she went completely slack-jawed. Deanna didn't think that she'd ever seen her mother look quite that astonished.
"You're not serious," she said, but she was speaking from
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her surprised state of mind, because she was already more than aware that Deanna was not kidding in the least. "Dean-na, what. .. what were you thinking? He's completely wrong for you. Certainly you must know that."
"May I remind you, Mother, that you didn't like Will Riker when I first brought him home."
"Nonsense. I adored him."
Deanna openly gaped at her mother. "Now you're the one who can't be serious, Mother! You threatened to bring him up on charges before Starfleet if he continued to be interested in me. Is that your definition of a ringing endorsement?"
"You were young and too easily swayed," Lwaxana said dismissively. "I was simply watching out for your own good. As an individual, though, I found him perfectly acceptable. Even charming in a rugged, tactless sort of way. I just didn't want you to make a mistake...."
"And what's the excuse now, Mother? I'm quite a few years older than I was then. Are you still claiming that I'm still not sufficiently mature to know my own mind?"
"I'm just..." She tried to steady her hands as she gestured with them, since they were trembling with confusion and frustration. "I'm just saying that I've seen Mr. Woof in action ..."
"Worf! His name is Worf!"
"Deanna Worf." Lwaxana shuddered at the notion.
"I wouldn't be Deanna Worf. If I chose to adapt to that Earth custom, I'd be Deanna Rozhenko."
"Oh, well that's just ever so much better. You'd trade Troi for Rozhenko? While you're at it, why don't you add another five syllables to 'Deanna'? And have you considered children? What would they look like? Half Betazoid, half Klingon? Half telepath, half warrior? They'd go around telling everyone what to think. They'd be at home nowhere in the galaxy."
"Congratulations, Mother," Deanna said dryly. "We haven't even taken any vows yet and you've already had us give birth to pariahs."
Lwaxana waved dismissively, like an imperious queen.
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"You're right, it's ridiculous to discuss this. I won't give permission for it."
"Permission?" Deanna was astounded at her mother's presumptuousness. "Mother ... I came here to share happy news with you. But I did not come looking for your permission. Even if you 'forbid' it, I will still do as my heart tells me."
"Then your heart should be steering you to Will Riker." Deanna put her face in her hands and moaned softly. "This from the woman who arranged a marriage for me when I was a child."
"Deanna." Lwaxana took her daughter's hand in hers. "I don't pretend that I haven't made mistakes in my time. More than my share, if truth be known. And I haven't... I haven't always done right by you. I know that, I admit it.. ." "Mother, don't be so hard on yourself. . . ." "But removed by a distance of years, I'm able t
o see not only my mistakes, but yours." "How comforting it must be to be all-seeing." Any trace of sarcasm in Deanna's voice was completely missed-or else simply and deliberately ignored-by Lwaxana. "Riker was your Imzadi, and you were his. I admit I was angry about it at the time, but it seems now, in retrospect, that you were destined to be a couple. You complemented each other in so many ways. When fate brought the two of you together again on the Enterprise, that wasn't coincidence. It couldn't have been. It was meant for you two to be together again."
"We ... are just. .. friends," Deanna said patiently. "Does Riker know about this . . . this engagement?" "Yes. And he was the first to raise a glass in a toast to us." Lwaxana shook her head, discouraged. "Then he is as foolish as you. Then again, I expected more from you." "Mother, why are you so opposed to this . . . ?" "Because . . ." She sighed. "Deanna . . . you're talking to a woman who has spent her entire life honing her emotions and
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feelings. They are, to me, a sort of natural resource. You should understand: You're an empath. To me, it just... it feels wrong. Feels so profoundly wrong that I can't even begin to articulate why."
"Well, don't you see, Mother? To me, it feels as right as it does wrong to you. So who's to say who's right?"
"I am."
Deanna almost laughed at that until she saw that Lwaxana was deadly serious. Suddenly she felt a small buzz of alarm. "Mother . . . what do you mean by that?"
"If you go through with this," Lwaxana said flatly, "then at your marriage, you will not be allowed to drink from the Sacred Chalice of Rixx."
Deanna was floored. It was as if her mother had hit her upside the head with a heated poker. "Mother!" she cried out as if stricken. "The women of the Fifth House have drunk from the Sacred Chalice at their weddings for over six centuries! Six centuries of tradition, Mother! That's when the chalice is passed down to its new holder!"