The room was furnished ("decorated" would certainly not be the right word) very simply and very functionally. A bed, some dresser drawers, and that was all. Still, it seemed like a palace compared with what Deanna and Alexander had. Deanna stood there, arms folded, saying nothing.
"We have to talk," Tom said. "I had hoped to do it... well... in our heads . . ."
"I will never ... let you in ... again. Do we understand each other?"
"Perfectly." He took a deep breath and then, in so low a voice she could barely hear him, he said, "First... I want to thank you for not. . . betraying me."
"I felt there was enough betrayal for the one day, didn't you?"
"All right. All right, I had that coming."
She was silent for a time, and then her curiosity got the better of her when it seemed as if he wasn't volunteering any more information. "So how was the plan supposed to go?"
"I was ..." He cleared his throat. "I was supposed to come to you .. . we'd talk ... we would get together with Worf and Alexander . .. and then Sela and her people would show up and grab the four of us. They were then going to use you and Alexander as leverage to get Worf to do something for them."
"I see. But not you."
"We were . . . there was going to be a staged rescue attempt on my part. I was going to be 'knocked out,' taken out of the picture. All the pressure was going to be on Worf. He would have cooperated rather than let you and Alexander die. After all... he loves you."
284
I M 2 A D I II
"Yes. Yes, he does."
"And you love him."
"Yes, I do," she said defiantly. "And I would do anything for him. And I would never betray him. Not... ever. Do you understand the concept of loyalty? Do you? Because the man I once knew, the man I thought you were ... he understood it."
He saw it in her eyes, saw the fury and contempt, and the simple unfairness of it caused a surge of anger in him. "Do you want to know what I understand?"
"No-"
"I understand," he steamrolled over her disinterest, "that the universe is more unfair than anyone could have given it credit for. I understand what it's like to live a life where the choices that you make make no difference. I understand what it's like not to be unique. I understand what it's like to know that, no matter what I do, I will never be the man ... that I already am. And you can't know that. Oh, you could understand it if you wanted to. You're a damn empath, after all. You could understand anything if you put your mind to it. But I'm not worth even that, am I. I'm not entitled to the slightest bit of understanding from you, Miss Perfect, Miss Deanna Troi."
"Stop feeling sorry for yourself. It's beneath you."
"I love you . . . don't you understand that?"
"Oh, really. And what is Sela then? A happenstance? A diversion?"
"She's a kindred spirit. That's what she is. She has a ghost haunting her .. . her mother, and what she was to the Federation, just as I have my own personal spectre in... him. Neither of us, thanks to circumstances beyond our control, is possibly able to live up to the expectations built up for us by others. And so we chose our own lives, and made something for ourselves, and to hell with the expectations and demands of others."
To her surprise, Deanna actually felt tears of sadness stinging her eyes. She forced them back. "And is this the life you truly wanted? Being a felon? Hiding in some barren rock
285
somewhere? Conspiring with Romulans to do . . . whatever it is that you're planning? What is it, anyway?"
"I'm ... I don't know."
"You don't know? Or you just won't say?"
"I don't know. Sela said she didn't feel the need to tell me. And I didn't feel it wise to push."
"Incredible. I don't know you. The kind of man you've become .. . the William Riker I knew wouldn't have gone along with all this. He would have tried to stop it, he wouldn't have been satisfied with not knowing, he ..."
And then something clicked in her head. She looked up at him. "Wait... I don't understand."
"What don't you understand?"
"The ..."
"Never mind," he said sharply, cutting her off. "None of it matters. You made it clear when I was with you on Betazed that you didn't want to be with me. They were listening in ... Kressn was there . . . and when they realized that you weren't going to be cooperative, they simply took matters into their own hands. So if you're looking for fault to be tossed around, you don't have to look any further than the mirror. If you had given me a chance, things might have gone differently. But no. No, I don't fit into your perfect universe. And you know what, Deanna? That's your loss. That is your damned loss."
He strode to the door and it opened automatically. Without waiting for her to follow, he said to the two Romulans who were standing nearby, "Take her back to the cell." Without another word, he stalked off.
Tom lay in Sela's bed, the Romulan woman curled up on his chest. He was staring at the ceiling. "You're rather quiet this evening," she said.
"Don't have much to say."
"That hasn't stopped you before."
"Oh. An insult." He affected a look of being hurt. "You know how to cut me, Sela."
286
"Yes. But I hope it won't be necessary." She rolled over, propping her head up with one hand, and idly fingered his chest hair. "I keep dwelling on how things went wrong on Betazed."
"It's my fault. I've already told you that. I completely misjudged her ... thought there was still something there ..."
"That's not what I was thinking about, actually," Sela said. She seemed to be appraising him, trying to dissect him with her eyes. "I was thinking about what happened at the cliff-side."
"I told you ... I thought he was going to get to you. I was trying to keep him away from you."
"I was armed. I had a clear shot at him."
"Perhaps. But I've seen him in action far more than you have, Sela," he reminded her. "Considering his state of mind, considering the speed with which he was moving, considering a thousand factors that all came together at that one moment. . . frankly, there was no guarantee that your disrup-tor shot would have been able to stop him. You had endangered his fiancee. If he'd gotten his hands on you, he could have snapped your neck in an instant. I was acting purely on instinct. I'm sorry if my desire to save you from harm was so overwhelming that it impeded our mission."
"Now, don't sound hurt," Sela scolded. "However, I'm thinking about how it worked out in the short term. Had you trusted me to stop him, we would have him here and the plan would proceed as intended."
"The plan that you still haven't told me," he reminded her.
As if he hadn't spoken, Sela continued, "But you knocked him off the cliff, sent him into the water. And thanks to the sudden appearance of the Klingons, he was lost to us. So if you were trying to thwart our plan without knowing what it was ... that would have been the way to do it."
"Are you saying I'm in league with the Klingons, too? That I knew they were going to show up?"
287
"No. No, that would be a bit much. Still, it could have been simply a lucky coincidence. You could have been trying to buy time in hopes that some other opportunity might come along."
"You're saying you don't trust me." He sat up, shaking his head in disbelief. "You invite me into your bed, for God's sake. And you still don't trust me?"
Sela didn't seem particularly perturbed over his annoyance. In fact, she even seemed slightly playful. She ran her fingers across his bare thigh, causing a slight tremble through his body, and she said, "Trust is required for love, Riker. What we have is sex. Unless that is no longer satisfactory to you?"
Then she brought her mouth down on his as she slid her hand upward. He gasped into her mouth and they parted momentarily as he managed to say, "It's .. . more than satisfactory..."
"I'm glad to hear it," she said as she moved against him.
And for a little while, Tom Riker was able to toss aside his concerns about the unfairness of
the universe, and bury himself deep within someone who-he truly did believe-was in many ways a kindred spirit. And when their passion was spent, and Tom felt exhaustion overwhelming him, as he slid into sleep he wondered-as he all too oftentimes did-what Will Riker was up to.
Knowing him, Tom mused, if I'm lying next to a naked woman ... he's probably lying next to three....
288
CHAPTER
18
fill Riker lay on his bed, surrounded by men, for yet another night and once more didn't sleep.
The other men were not in the bed with him, of course. They were in their own beds, although that might have been too generous a term. They were the hard-mattressed bedlike things that were standard issue on Lazon II.
Will couldn't recall the last time he had slept soundly, or at all. He must have done so at some point. One simply couldn't stay awake for days on end. It just wasn't possible. Very likely, here and there, he had dozed. But at this point he was so disconnected from reality that time had ceased to have any meaning for him.
Mudak checked his surveillance cameras from his office and zoomed in on Riker, lying awake on his bed. He should have felt some degree of triumph over his recapture. Indeed, when he had first brought Riker off the vessel and dragged him through the main street of the penal colony, he had felt like a triumphant hunter. His superiors had noted, with utter deadpan, the battered look that Riker had about him after the voyage. "He tripped repeatedly" was the explanation that
289
Mudak had given his superiors. They had snickered and told Mudak to watch Riker more carefully in the future. Mudak assured them that he would be giving Riker extra special attention.
And Mudak had more than done so. For now, with Riker having his reputation as escapee on his record, and with Saket no longer around to run interference, Mudak had been unstinting in his torment of Riker. From verbal abuse to shock prods to flat-out beatings, Mudak had unleashed upon Riker everything and anything that occurred to him.
And Riker hadn't seemed to notice.
This was, to put it mildly, annoying to Mudak. At least before when he had abused Riker, he could count on an angry glare, or harsh words back, or some show of defiance. But that wasn't happening anymore. Mudak would have liked to think that perhaps he had managed to break Riker's spirit altogether. That there was nothing left of the defiant prisoner that he had once been, the fight completely crushed. But that didn't seem to be the explanation either. Riker appeared to have spirit, all right. It was in another direction, though. He didn't seem to be aware that he was in a prison camp, or at least he didn't seem to care. No matter what Mudak did to him, it got no response beyond an occasional grunt of acknowledgment.
The processing chores of Lazon II were out of commission at the present time. Prisoners were still busy rebuilding the place from the damage that had been done during the Romulan attack. The prisoners were no more thrilled with Riker than anyone else; after all, he had apparently forged an alliance with the individuals who had wound up causing all the damage in the first place. So during the workday, anything they themselves could do to make his life miserable-trip him up, slam into him too hard, whatever-they were more than happy to do.
Riker didn't seem to notice that, either.
290
Mudak simply could not understand. It was as if Riker's mind was light-years away.
Deanna. ..
It was as if she were just beyond his reach. As sleepless hours piled one atop the other, as his body became more and more strained and stressed, he could almost touch her, sense her right ahead of him. He felt as if he had been blind for his entire life and at last his eyes were opened. How could he have spent all these years thinking he had had a real connection to her when, clearly, until now he had no true concept of what that was?
When he walked, he sensed her beside him. When he ate food, she was his sustenance, when he breathed, her scent intoxicated him. She was everywhere in general and somewhere in specific, and he knew her....
Someone kicked his bed.
He was only vaguely aware of it, as he was only vaguely aware of most things, since his mind was not part of his trials on Lazon II. He slowly swiveled his gaze and saw Mudak standing over him.
"On your feet, Riker," growled Mudak. "You have a visitor."
"Deanna?" he whispered. Except somehow he knew it wasn't Deanna, it couldn't be, yes, it couldn't because she was so far away, so far ... and yet he could feel her .. .
"No, not Deanna," Mudak said in disgust. He hauled Will to his feet. "There's a world outside your precious Deanna, you know."
"No. No ... there's not," Will replied, but Mudak paid him no mind as he pulled him out of the dorm and toward the small, squat temporary building that housed his office.
Worf couldn't quite believe it when he saw Riker hauled into the office by Mudak and shoved unceremoniously into a chair. To a certain degree, he couldn't get past the fact that Tom was
291
identical to Will. He felt as if he were seeing his longtime commander in such an abused condition, rather than a known traitor and felon. "I don't know what you hope to discover, Mr. Worf," Mudak said as he moved around his desk and took his place behind it. "The Betazoids already scanned his mind and said there was no knowledge of what transpired on the planet. I don't see why you think you'll have better luck."
"But you will allow me to question him?"
"Well.. ." Mudak smiled, his dark and merciless eyes almost glowing with an ebony light. "Considering the Klingon reputation for information extraction, my assumption had been that you were going to hurt him. Who am I to stand in the way of that?"
"Hopefully it will not come to that."
Mudak studied him curiously. "Really? Hmm. Are you sure you're a Klingon?"
"If that was meant as humor, I did not appreciate it," Worf said stiffly. He moved around Riker, looking him over. "Tom."
Riker didn't respond.
"Tom," he said again.
Slowly, ever so slowly, Riker looked up at him. There were bruises on his face, a cut just above his eye, and his lower lip looked swollen. "Worf? That you?"
"Yes, Tom."
"Will. .." He coughed heavily, sounding as if he was trying to clear half a ton of debris out of his lungs. "I'm .. . I'm Will Riker. . ."
"You have been positively identified as Tom Riker," Worf said flatly. "Starfleet confirms that Will Riker is back on Earth____"
"She's out there, Worf. . . wasting time here ..." His voice drifted in and out. "We can ... go get her . .. take you to her . . ."
The statement startled Worf. "It's a trick!" Mudak said, but Worf paid him no mind. Instead he crouched next to Riker and said, "You know where she is ... ?"
292
"Where ... no ... don't know ... but... feel her ... take you . .."
"This is nonsense," Mudak said. "You said it yourself, Worf: Starfleet reports him as back on Earth...."
Riker shook his head with what appeared to be extreme effort. "Not... me ... left ... left holosuite ... message ... outsmarted myself. . ." His shoulders shook as if he were laughing, and then he coughed once more. "It's me, Worf. .. get me ... get me out of here . .."
"If you are Will Riker," Worf said, "then what happened to us on-"
"Oh, no you don't," Mudak said quickly. "No, you don't. You're not going to start asking him Enterprise trivia questions, the answers to which he could easily have found out from ships' logs or any of a hundred public sources. Or anecdotes that Will Riker might have shared with his other self back when Tom was aboard the Enterprise."
"If this man is William Riker, I have to know it."
"This man is my prisoner, and there is no way that I am going to allow you to make a mockery of that. He got away from me. No one gets away from me," Mudak said, his voice beginning to rise above its normally quiet and controlled tone. "He is going to stay here until he rots."
"Even if he is not Tom Riker?"
"He is Tom Riker! There has b
een no mistake. I do not make mistakes, therefore none has been made."
"That is ridiculous."
"Really." Mudak took a step closer to Worf. "And tell me, Klingon .. . were I to stand here, let you ask questions, be 'satisfied' that he is your man and leave with him . . . how much of a fool would you consider me to be? After all, the Klingons and Romulans have a historic alliance. Perhaps it is being restored, and your presence here is an indicator of that."
"What are you saying?" Worf demanded, sounding rather dangerous.
"I am saying that if I were the Romulans who had broken
293
Riker and Saket out... and the Klingons were my allies ... I would simply ask for a well-known and somewhat respected Klingon to be sent to Lazon Two for the purpose of declaring that a mistake has been made and walking out with a Cardas-sian prisoner."
The atmosphere in the office seemed to crackle with energy, and then the tense silence was broken by Riker's voice as he said, "Worf.. . remember when . . . you announced your engagement.. . ?"
Worf looked at him. "Yes .. ."
"In Ten-Forward .. . you looked at Geordi and me ... you saw me sitting there . . . you looked right in my eyes .. . when I raised a glass to you ..." He paused and then, with a ferocity that Worf wouldn't have quite believed possible, he said, "What I really wanted to do ... put my fist... down your throat.. ."
And then he passed out.
Without hesitation, Worf said to Mudak, "This is Will Riker. I want him freed at once."
"This is my prisoner," replied Mudak, "and you will take him over my dead body."
For a moment, Worf s hand drifted toward the phaser he had slung from his belt...
And Mudak's blaster was already in his hand. Worf hadn't even blinked, and so could scarcely believe what he had just seen. Mudak was conceivably the fastest draw he'd ever met. "And if you should get past me," Mudak continued, as if pulling the weapon on Worf had required no effort at all, "in case you have forgotten, there are half a dozen guards outside the door, and many more between you and the vessel that you landed nearby. Would you care to take on those odds, carrying an unconscious body?"