now she snapped fully into place, three-dimensional and looking as real and substantial as anyone else on the bridge. Since she didn’t truly breathe, the gasp was more a residue of human reactions than any actual intake of breath. Nevertheless, the reaction spoke volumes.
Robin Lefler’s image was visible on-screen. She was cradling Cwansi in her arms.
“Hi. If anyone over there is hearing this: I think I need to talk to my mother,” she said.
Brethren Transport Vessel
Mackenzie Calhoun had a great deal to say, and no one to whom he could say it.
He had been monitoring subspace chatter as he piloted the vessel away from Xenex, and he had been appalled at what he was hearing. All the trouble that the Excalibur was in, the assault on New Thallon, and now his ship was in fugitive status…
It was obvious what was happening. Morgan was attempting some manner of endgame. It was why she had shunted Calhoun from the ship. She had put him as far away from her as she could manage and was now setting the ship up to… what? Be destroyed? And what would happen to her?
Well, that much was obvious, wasn’t it? She would have some sort of out. While the Excalibur was left as a bunch of floating scraps in space, she would be residing somewhere comfortable such as the Federation core database. No one living would have the slightest idea that she had been at all involved.
But why? Why such a byzantine plan?
He would have loved to ask her. Unfortunately, the only thing he had going for him at this point was that Morgan didn’t know where he was or what he was up to.
Which meant that Calhoun’s hands were tied.
He had to assume the worst when it came to Morgan’s abilities. If he tried to send out a subspace message informing Starfleet of where he was and what had happened, it was entirely likely that Morgan would pick up on it and trace it back to its source. That being the case, she might seize control of the ship’s navigation, turn him right around, and send him back to Xenex.
Or she might choose to crash him.
Or just blow the ship up around him.
There was no shortage of things that Morgan could do in order to head off any plans that Calhoun might have to find his ship and rendezvous with it. For that matter, considering that Starfleet must have come to the conclusion that Calhoun had gone out of his mind, he could not safely assume that communicating with them would wind up having the slightest impact. In sum, there was very little for him to gain and a tremendous amount for him to lose.
There was one thing that Calhoun did have on his side, though. He knew his crew. Particularly his command crew.
They would figure it out.
He was assuming that Morgan was posing as him, rather than having taken over the ship and forcing it to head to New Thallon. That would be a lot of work, compelling the starship to go that distance with the knowledge that they had been taken over by the computer. Why do all that when it would be much simpler to make them think that the captain was still aboard? He knew full well of Morgan’s chameleon-like ability to pose as others, and it made sense that she would employ it in that manner to minimize the muss and fuss.
But why New Thallon? What reason would Morgan put forward for going there? Once upon a time, the Thallonians had been central to the Excalibur’s mission, but now, much less so. Why there, of all places?
Ultimately Calhoun decided that it didn’t matter. Whether it was luck of the draw, or part of some master plan, it was irrelevant to the immediate situation: His ship had launched an unprovoked attack on a world and was now on the run because of it. And he, who had been parsecs away, was considered to be responsible.
Morgan would be clamping down on the Excalibur’s communications systems; that was just an obvious course of action for her to take. So he had to assume he wouldn’t be able to contact them, nor would they be able to reach him. But assuming that they had, at the very least, control of navigation—which wasn’t a safe assumption, but it was one that Calhoun had to make—then there was only one place that they would be heading. They would be making a beeline for Xenex, the last