Fortune's Light Part 19

She nodded, doing her best to fas.h.i.+on a smile. "Dr. Crusher just sent word. Commander Riker will pull through."

A grin spread over the crewman's face. "That's good news," he told her. "h.e.l.l, that's great news."

"Yes," she said. "It is, isn't it?"

Two levels down, he departed and she was alone again. But not truly alone, for another crewman could walk in at any time.

Finally the lift came to a stop at her destination. A familiar sight greeted her: the corridor that led to her suite.

Normally it was a busy place at this time of day. As luck would have it, it was deserted now.

She was grateful.

The entrance to her residence was programmed to respond to her approach. It obeyed that programming and she breezed inside, hardly noticing when it sealed itself off in her wake.

Will ...

She headed for her bedroom. Only after she'd reached it and another set of doors had closed behind her did she allow herself to crumble.

Slumping against the wall, she felt the sobs well up from deep within her. And she cried as she had seldom cried before.

Chapter Eleven.

"YOU KNOW, Will m' boy, it's too bad."

"What is?"

"That we couldn't have brought some of that Dibdinagii joy juice back with us."

Will smiled. "It packed a punch, didn't it? Like some of the stuff we used to drink on a dare back home."

"Nothing like this synthehol they're producing now. The Ferengi are traders, not revelers. They wouldn't know a fine liqueur if they drowned in one."

"Maybe not. But when there's no fine liqueur to be had, synthehol's a d.a.m.n sight better than ... uh, Teller?"

"Yes?"

"Do you mind if I ask what you're doing?"

"I'm taking off my boot. What does it look like?"

"In the officers' mess? Is this some custom you picked up from the Dibdinagii?"

"I picked up a custom, all right. But it has nothing to do with footwear."

Teller turned his boot upside down, and a slim leather pouch fell into his lap. He tossed it in the air, caught it.

"Joy juice," he announced. "Dried and sterilized, of course, so it wouldn't set off the biofilter alarms." He plunked the pouch down on the table.

"In your boot. I don't believe it."

"I keep all my valuables in my boots. An old Conlon family tradition, starting with me. Because no one ever thinks to look there."

"But this is contraband, Teller. If they catch you with this, you'll be drummed out of Starfleet."

"True-if they catch me. Which they won't."

He walked over to an automated food unit and ordered two gla.s.ses of water. It took him a moment to mix in the powder. Then he came back to the table.

"Care to join me, Will?"

"You're crazy. Out-and-out crazy."

"One drink, then I toss the rest away. How's that?"

"To prove what?"

Teller shrugged. "That all things are possible. That a man can do anything if he just sets his mind to it."

"And you'd risk your career for that?"

Another shrug, a light in his eyes. "Of course, if you're too frightened of getting caught ..."

"Frightened isn't the word. Try 'petrified.' "

"Then I guess I'll be drinking alone."

There was something contagious about Teller's particular madness. Riker had learned that a long time ago.

"All right." He glanced over his shoulder at the entrance to the mess. "Do it. Just be quick about it."

"Quick as you please. Here you go. Whoa-wait a second."

"What now?"

"A toast, of course." He raised his gla.s.s. "To the art of the possible."

"Sure. To that."

They drank.

"Ah. Now, you can't say that didn't hit the spot."

"It hit all the spots. Now get rid of that pouch."

"Hey, I keep my bargains, Ensign Riker. No one ever said a Conlon went back on his-"

"Teller! Someone's coming!"

"You've got ears like a bat, Will, you know that?" Teller crossed the room. "Are you sure you're not part Ferengi yourself?"

The sliding-aside of the door, a dour look. "Gentlemen." A pause. "The two of you look like cats who've swallowed canaries."

"Beg your pardon, sir?"

A slowly spreading frown. "Don't beg, Mr. Conlon. It isn't becoming. But as long as you're wrestling with that food dispenser, you can get me a cup of coffee. Make that a strong cup-it's been a long sh.o.r.e leave."

"Aye, Captain. Three cups of coffee, coming right up."

The smell of fresh-brewed coffee. Sunlight on his eyelids, a pinkish orange incandescence. He opened his eyes and saw the room.

The first thing he noticed was the fire in the hearth. But something was wrong. Wasn't the hearth in the wrong place? He looked around. This wasn't the room he'd been in before, the hotel room where he'd first met Lyneea. This was somewhere else.

A door opened behind him, and he tried to turn in response. He never quite got all the way around-a sharp pain in his shoulder stopped him.

That was when he realized he had a portable regenerator strapped to his shoulder. He looked at it stupidly.

"Ah. You're awake."

It wasn't Lyneea's voice, but he knew it all the same. No. That can't be, he told himself. She's up on the s.h.i.+p.

Then Dr. Crusher came around the couch he was lying on, and he had to admit that it could be. h.e.l.l, it was.

And that would explain where the regenerator had come from.

"How do you feel?" she asked, pulling a chair over to sit beside him. In one hand she held a cup of coffee.

The word "fine" started to come out of his mouth. Then he felt his shoulder, worked it in its socket, and suffered that darting pain again. "This hurts," he told her. As he looked into her bewitching green eyes, he remembered why. "The knife, right?"

She nodded. "The knife."

"Then Lyneea called the s.h.i.+p after all." He grunted. "How about that?"

"But not without a lot of soul-searching," Crusher pointed out. "She wasn't too happy about using your communicator, what with that high-tech ban they have around here. And when I took out my tricorder ... forget it. I thought she was going to bite right through her lip."

Riker regarded her. "You shouldn't be here. It's too dangerous."

"You should have thought of that before you went and got yourself skewered."

"You can't go back, you know. Not until the end of the carnival."

The doctor rolled her eyes. "Believe me, I know. I've only been told half a dozen times, by everyone from the captain to Lyneea to those two strong-arm types who lugged you here in the middle of the night."

Of course. They'd had to get him off the streets somehow, and there were no mechanical conveyances in Besidia.

"This isn't where we were staying before," he noted.

"No. They thought it might not be safe there any longer. Also, this place was closer to the market. It was hard enough to carry you this far."

Riker took it all in. "Where's Lyneea now?" he asked.

Crusher shrugged. "d.a.m.ned if I know. She muttered something about time running out-and then ran out herself."

Time running out? He didn't like the sound of that.

He sat halfway up-and winced at the searing pain that erupted in his shoulder. "d.a.m.n," he breathed, easing himself back down onto the couch.

"Serves you right," she told him.

"How long have I been lying here?" he asked.

The doctor set aside her coffee, leaned over and searched through a pack on the floor, finally extracting her tricorder. "Almost two days, thanks to the dimexidrine."

"Two ... days?" he echoed.

Crusher straightened, looked him in the eye. "Why? Did you think you'd have come this far in less time? Or without the aid of a sedative?" She placed a forefinger against his chest-and none too gently. "Listen to me, Will Riker. I know exactly what you're thinking."

"You do?"

"Yes. You think you're going to leap up and go after Lyneea, as if you were fully recuperated, but you're not. Forty-eight hours ago you were knocking at death's door. There wasn't enough blood left in you to sustain a good-sized rodent. Plus you had a nasty concussion." She sighed. "I practice medicine, Commander, not magic. It's going to take time for that shoulder to heal properly, even with the regenerator working nonstop. And then some more time for you to get your strength back. In sickbay it might have happened a little faster, but not much. You're not made of duranium, Mister. Remember that."

He smiled a little at the doctor's speech. Of course she had a point. In this condition he wouldn't be much help to Lyneea. And she had the strong-arm types if she really needed help.

Crusher set her tricorder and held it near his shoulder. Judging by her expression, his progress met with her approval.

"How am I doing?" he asked.

"Could be worse," she told him.

What was it Lyneea had said to him in the beginning? Something about Imprimans taking care of their own problems?

Well, she'd finally gotten it her way. With Riker laid up, Lyneea could conduct the kind of investigation she preferred, without having to play nursemaid to an offworlder. Especially one who thought he knew her world because he'd been here once for a couple of months.

On the other hand, he had made some contributions. He'd saved her life when Bosch was about to draw a blaster on her in his room. And if it hadn't been for his stubbornness, they might never have found Teller's body.

But then, he'd also fallen for Norayan's ruse, and he'd nearly lost his life to the Pandrilite in that alley. And wasn't it Riker who'd blundered into Kobar, putting him on his guard-and maybe drawing the attention of his would-be a.s.sa.s.sin in the process?

"You look pensive," observed Crusher. "Can it be I've actually drummed some sense into you?"

He looked up at her. "Did Lyneea find out anything about the knife thrower? Like whom he worked for?"

The doctor put the tricorder away and shook her head. "No."