The Light Read online

  Star Trek™:

  Corps of Engineers

  Turn the Page by Dayton Ward & Kevin Dilmore

  Troubleshooting by Robert Greenberger

  The Light by Jeff D. Jacques

  COMING SOON:

  The Art of the Comeback by Glenn Greenberg

  Signs from Heaven by Phaedra M. Weldon

  An Original Publication of POCKET BOOKS

  POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2007 by CBS Studios Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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  Chapter

  1

  A s Sonya Gomez lay in bed and stared at the remarkably dull ceiling, she wondered, not for the first time, whether anyone would notice if she snuck into an airlock and shot herself into the void of space. Being the middle of shipboard night, she could probably do it. Alarms would go off once she did the deed, of course, and her gamma-shift crewmates would act quickly to beam her back once they realized someone was floating about in the frigid vacuum. Within ten seconds, she’d be beamed directly to sickbay, where valiant attempts would be made to revive her. They would, sadly, fail. At least, they would in this particular scenario of morbid speculation.

  Gomez sighed morosely and closed her eyes, giving her head a chiding shake in the process. No, that would be taking the easy way out. But how the hell was she going to face Fabian in the morning after what had happened? Or Corsi? Or herself in the damn mirror? What had she been thinking?

  It had started out easily enough—which should have been her first indication that disaster would rear its head before long. As head of the da Vinci’s S.C.E. team, she was no stranger to missions that appeared fairly simple at the outset, but proved to be—often at the most inopportune time—to be anything but. But this hadn’t been a mission. It had been a simple visit with a good friend.

  Simple.

  “Commander,” Fabian Stevens said when the door to the cabin he shared with Bart Faulwell swished open. If the expression on the tactical specialist’s face was any indication, Gomez must have looked as bad as she felt: glassy eyes, tear-streaked face, rat’s-nest hair—in a word, pathetic. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m a wreck, Fabian,” Gomez said, in case it wasn’t immediately apparent by her appearance. As an officer in a leadership position, it wasn’t an easy admission for her to make, but if she was here to bare her soul to Stevens, then she might as well start right away. “Do you have a few minutes?”

  “Of course. C’mon in,” he said and stepped aside. “Can I get you something? Some tea, Earl Grey, hot, perhaps?” he asked with a grin. But Gomez wasn’t in the mood for levity, and once that realization hit Fabian, his expression faltered.

  “No, thank you. Wait,” she amended immediately with a shake of her head. “Yes, I do. Some tea would be nice.”

  Stevens gave her a bemused look. “You’re sure now? I don’t want to force anything on you….” Gomez flashed him the I’m-not-in-the-mood expression she often inflicted upon Tev. “Right. Tea it is.” He grinned and went to the replicator. “Have a seat, Commander.”

  “We’re off duty, Fabian,” Gomez told him. “Right now, I’m just Sonya.”

  “Okay.” The replicator hummed softly, and Stevens reached in for the tea.

  Gomez glanced around the room as she moved toward the small centralized couch. “Bart’s not here?” she asked, though clearly Fabian’s roomie wasn’t.

  “No, he’s out wandering the ship,” Stevens said as he moved to join her. Bart Faulwell, the ship’s linguist and cryptography specialist, didn’t maintain normal sleeping hours, so while most people assigned to alpha shift were snuggled in their beds, awaiting the dawn of the next day, Bart could be found doing some research, or studying a mission-specific alien language, or nursing a French roast coffee while he wrote a new letter to his other half, Anthony Mark—though he hadn’t been doing much of the latter lately. “He only left about fifteen minutes ago, so I don’t expect him back anytime soon.”

  Stevens handed her the cup of tea, and Gomez accepted it with thanks as he sat next to her. The scent of bergamot tickled her nose as she brought the cup to her lips and blew on the steaming liquid. But rather than take a sip, she set it down on the low table in front of her. All the while, she felt Stevens’s eyes watching her closely.

  “No offense, Sonya, but you really do look like a wreck,” he said. “Did something happen? You seemed okay earlier.”

  “I’ve been keeping it contained,” Gomez said. She moved her legs up and sat cross-legged on the couch, leaning back against the ample cushion. And it’s tearing me apart.

  “Ah, the old Vulcan trick,” Stevens said with a nod, always ready to keep things light, even when it wasn’t called for. “Not always a wise tactic if your ears aren’t pointed.” When Gomez allowed the joke to pass over her head, Stevens turned serious again. He placed a hand on one of her jutting knees and gave it a gentle squeeze. “C’mon, Sonya, what’s going on?”

  Sonya sighed and already felt her eyes growing moist. “It’s…It’s Kieran.”

  Stevens’s eyebrows lifted upon hearing the name of his deceased best friend. “What does Duff have to do with this?” Kieran Duffy, Stevens’s best friend on the da Vinci and Gomez’s lover and might-have-

  been husband, had perished along with half the crew during the ill-fated Galvan VI mission ten months ago.

  “Everything,” Gomez said, then shook her head. No, that wasn’t entirely true. What am I doing, blaming the dead guy for my problems? I thought I was past this. “I don’t know, I…everything and nothing.”

  Stevens frowned again and gave his hairline a quick scratch. “Uh, Sonya, that…you’re not really making any sense.”

  “I know!” Gomez blurted, splayed fingers quivering at the side of her head in frustration. “And that’s part of the problem, isn’t it? I barely understand what I’m thinking myself.” She took a breath, then let it out slowly. Okay, here it comes. “Do you remember Captain Omthon?”

  Stevens nodded. “The green guy, sure. Cappy, wasn’t it?”

  “Pappy,” Gomez corrected. “And his name is Wayne, if you want to be specific.” She’d only thought of Wayne occasionally since their failed rendezvous at Recreational Station Hidalgo, and while his absence had been disappointing, her stay there hadn’t been completely uneventful. This was due in large part to a couple of distractions, namely the dashing Tobias Shelt, who had rescued her from having to spend her vacation alone, and the little fact that a simulacrum of herself had taken Hidalgo hostage.

  “Okay,” Stevens said. “Wayne. You two have been trying to get together for a while, right?”

  “Trying, being the key word. First it was the Strata spinning ship t
hat kept us from meeting up at Galor IV, then he had to cancel our shore leave together at Hidalgo. It’s like Fate is doing its damned best to keep us apart. And I do want to get together with him, Fabian, like you wouldn’t believe.” Not that spending time with Tobias had been a drag, but it had made her long for Wayne even more. Gomez paused to wipe a tear that had spilled down her cheek. And why the hell hadn’t she called him in the six months since then to set something else up? Was she afraid of being turned down, of something getting in the way again? “I think I’m overdue for some getting together, if you know what I mean. I know I am. It’s time. He likes me, and I really like him. What could be more perfect? He stirs in me a hunger I haven’t felt in a long time—too long a time—and it’s not just because his skin is the color of pistachio ice cream.”

  Stevens shifted in his seat, as though a bit uncomfortable listening to her womanly wants and desires, but Gomez didn’t care about that right now. She was venting, she was on a roll, and he was damn well going to listen.

  “Uh, so what’s the problem?” Stevens asked.

  “Kieran!” Gomez let out a growl of exasperation and resisted the urge to wrap her fingers around Stevens’s throat to give him a friendly strangle. “God, haven’t you been listening?”

  And then Stevens laughed—he actually had the nerve to laugh! At her misery! Had she made a mistake coming here, to unleash her frustrations on a man who saw a joke in every situation?

  “Sonya, Sonya, I’m sorry. Here, c’mere.” Grinning, he threw an arm around her shoulder and pulled her close before she had a chance to bluster away. His nearness comforted her, and she allowed herself to melt into his friendly embrace. “I didn’t mean to laugh. I know this is difficult for you. And although I haven’t had much use for my little-known degree in Intergalactic Psychology, I’m going to offer up my own diagnosis.”

  Gomez sniffled. “You have a diagnosis for me?”

  “Absolutely,” Stevens said. “I won’t even charge you.” See, a joke. Gomez smiled again and waited. When he spoke again, his voice was soft, soothing. “Look, we all reacted to Duff’s death differently. Me, I’d be in the mess hall, and I’d expect him to stroll in at any moment and sit across from me with a quinine water. But I’ve gotten past it. I’ve accepted that he’s gone. With you, though, it’s different. Duff was your man, Sonya. You two were going to get married and live happily ever after. And then he was gone before you could do anything about it. Of course it’s going to take a little longer for you to adjust than the rest of us. You just have to give it time. Don’t rush it. When you’re ready, it’ll happen.”

  “But that’s just it, Fabian…I am ready. I want to move on,” Gomez said, and then all at once her emotional barrier dropped like an open floodgate, and words tumbled out of her as her body shuddered with sobs. “As much as I loved Kieran, as much…as much as I wish he was here with me now, I need to move on with my life. It’s not as if I’m waiting for him to miraculously appear out of the ether so we can resume our relationship—that’s ridiculous. But there’s a perfect man out there who…who wants to be with me, who wants to be my friend—and something’s keeping us apart. I don’t know if it’s me, or just coincidence, or…oh, Fabian, I just don’t want to be alone anymore.”

  And then she broke down entirely, giving herself a good cry, something she hadn’t known was waiting to get out until it was there, spilling unceremoniously onto Stevens’s shirt. He whispered words of comfort in her ear as he stroked her dark curls. As her sobs subsided, she tilted her head upward and saw Stevens looking at her, a smile of compassion and understanding on his face. He had always been a friend she could count on in a time of need, and he was proving it a hundredfold right now.

  So, naturally, that was the moment she chose to kiss him.

  It didn’t last long, no more than three seconds, she guessed, but it seemed as though their lips were locked for nothing short of a decade or so. Stevens didn’t return the kiss at all, bless him, and with good reason. He was in a relationship with the ship’s security chief, Domenica Corsi, and as they both knew—as everyone knew—she knew three hundred ways to kill a person, and that was before she even picked up a phaser. If Corsi found out about this, innocent though it was, Stevens’s continued existence—not to mention her own—might soon become far more complicated.

  Stevens let out a startled yelp, and a look of terror crossed his face as he scrambled out of reach, crawling backward over the rear of the couch, as though Gomez had just revealed she had the Tarellian plague. “Sonya!” he croaked. “What—what was that?”

  Gomez, equally mortified, managed to utter a startled gasp, as she clutched her forehead in shock. She felt the blood drain from her face so quickly she half expected to see it pooling at her feet.

  “Oh, God,” she said, backing away from the couch. She almost tripped over the table and staggered about in a daze. An overwhelming feeling of uncertainty claimed her, and for a moment Gomez felt as though she were lost in an alien landscape with no idea how she’d gotten there. Fortunately, the disorientation didn’t last long, and when she recovered her senses, such as they were, her eyes found Stevens still half-crouched behind the sofa as though worried she might come at him again. “I…” she managed, but no more words were forthcoming. What could she say? Sorry about that, buddy? Oops?

  With little else she could possibly do to salvage the situation, Gomez turned on her heel and ran the hell out of there as fast as she could.

  Almost five hours later, she was no closer to getting any sleep, nor had she come up with a viable solution that would allow her to shrug the incident off. No, this one was going to linger, in a bad way. If she was going to deal with it in a mature professional manner, she was going to need some sleep. Was that so much to ask?

  “Gold to Gomez.”

  Maybe she had fallen asleep, after all, and the captain’s summons just now was a part of this whole twisted nightmare. That would be ideal.

  No such luck. She sighed and leveled her gaze at the ceiling. “Gomez here.”

  “I apologize for waking you, Gomez—” I wish, she thought with a roll of her eyes. “—but Starfleet has just given us a priority mission that needs our immediate attention. Have your team assembled in observation in twenty minutes.”

  “Acknowledged, sir,” Gomez said, then sat up as her professional mode kicked into gear. This priority mission had her curious. What was so urgent that it couldn’t have waited another three hours?

  She rolled out of bed and headed to the sonic shower.

  Chapter

  2

  G omez didn’t exactly take her time getting to the meeting Gold had called, but neither did she make any effort to move any faster than her regular stride. It wasn’t a race, after all, and she would get there eventually.

  As she rode the turbolift to the bridge, Gomez wondered if she’d blown things out of proportion with what had happened with Stevens. Was she overreacting? It had been an innocent mistake that had bloomed in the heat of an emotional moment between two close friends. Surely things like that happened all the time. In fact, if she were to tell Corsi about it in the mess hall a day or two from now, they’d probably both get a rousing chuckle out of it.

  Like hell.

  The lift came to a halt, and Gomez stepped out onto the bridge. Gamma shift was still on duty, and she nodded at Winn Mara at tactical on her way to the observation lounge. As the door parted, she saw that everyone was already assembled around the long conference table, minus the captain, their quiet chatter drifting out as they met her gaze. It’s like they all know, she thought, even though she knew that wasn’t the case. Based on Stevens’s reaction last night, the last thing he’d want to do is blab about it. She glanced quickly at Stevens, and he flashed an awkward smile before finding something of interest on the bare table before him.

  Great. We’re off to a wonderful start. “Good morning, everyone,” she said. Maybe if she dove into business, it would allow her to shove the events
of last night aside. “I’m sorry for having to wake you up ahead of schedule, but the captain felt it couldn’t wait.”

  “Do you have any idea what this is about, Commander?” Corsi asked, turning her blond head in the first officer’s direction.

  Gomez held the security chief’s level gaze for a moment. She doesn’t know anything. She doesn’t know anything. “Only that Starfleet has ordered us on a priority mission. Beyond that, we’ll have to wait for an explanation from the captain.”

  As if on cue, the door hissed open again, and David Gold entered the room. Gomez took in the expression on Gold’s face and knew something was wrong. Well, not wrong, necessarily, but it was clear something had put him on edge, and she suspected the mission details he’d received from Starfleet were the source of that discomfort.

  But as a member of the Starfleet Corps of Engineers, Gomez knew, as did Gold, that they were often given assignments that weren’t ideal. Some of them, such as her experiences on Sarindar, Teneb, and Vemlar had provided some personal close calls she could have done without. And the Galvan VI incident…well, the point was that from one extreme to another, despite the odds, the ship and crew had always come through, working together to come out more or less intact.

  Gold paused behind his chair at the head of the table and took them all in with a glance. He inhaled deeply, then let it out as he finally sat down. Gomez couldn’t remember him being so hesitant about discussing a mission and thought he was being a little over-dramatic. How bad can it be?

  “All right, there’s no use in my stalling any longer,” Gold said, speaking more to himself, it seemed, than to those gathered before him. “We’ve been ordered to investigate a faint Borg power signature that was picked up on a remote planet deep in this sector two days ago by a Boslic freighter.”

  Borg? Okay, that is bad. Like the crack of a whip, Gold’s mention of the Borg snapped everyone in the room to attention, and a flurry of worried and uncertain looks passed from face to face around the table. Gomez herself was unable to suppress an involuntary shudder. Eleven years ago, she’d been aboard the Enterprise-D when they were forced into Starfleet’s first meeting with the cybernetic species. The meddlesome being Q had flung the ship some seven thousand light years to System J-25 in order to illustrate his point that humanity wasn’t ready for what awaited them out in the galaxy. It was an encounter that had claimed the lives of eighteen crewmembers, and one which Gomez had not forgotten. The experience had frightened her enough that, even today, any mention of the Borg gave her pause.