“DON’T BE NERVOUS,Picard, we’ll be fine,” Admiral Nechayev assured him as they sat behind the table in the Hall of Justice, Courtroom B, Starfleet Command. That was the confident tone of voice she used when sending people off on a particularly dangerous mission, recalled the captain.

The customary gallery visitors and reporters were not to be found this morning. The simple court was more somber and dark than usual. Everyone conversed in whispers, as if enemies were hiding a few centimeters away. Two technicians had finished installing a larger-than-normal visual screen, and they were running a few tests on it. Picard looked for supporters in the crowd, but he found none; his crew or anyone connected with the Rashanar incident had to wait to be called. As before at the memorial service, people either stared at him or avoided his eyes.

He finally noticed Ensign Brewster seated in the first row behind Nechayev. The aide gave Picard an encouraging smile. The captain shook his head, thinking that Brewster had to be the most unprepossessing person he had ever met. Less than a meter away, he could still look right past the ensign.

The doors at the back opened, and an antigrav container floated into the court, followed by a tall, lanky Starfleet officer. “Your prosecutor,” whispered Nechayev, “Commodore Korgan, and his telepathic aide, Commander Emery.”

Picard’s lips thinned. “I don’t think he’s ever lost a case.”

“I don’t know about that,” sniffed Nechayev, “but I know he has risen rather quickly through the ranks. Worry more about the admirals.”

It was difficult not to stare at the Medusan as he maneuvered his box on top of the table, with his aide making sure he was positioned comfortably. Emery then went to talk briefly with Ensign Brewster. Picard turned around in his seat and warned himself that he was mostly going to be a spectator here. When they let him talk, he had to be very careful about what he said.

As soon as the technicians finished, the sergeant-at-arms called everyone to find seats. Moments later, he ordered them to rise in order to introduce the tribunal as they filed in: Admiral Ross, Admiral Paris, and Admiral Nakamura, with Ross taking center seat.

William Ross nodded to the participants and said, “Five days ago, two Federation vessels, theU.S.S. Juno and the Ontailian heavy cruiserVuxhal, were destroyed in peacetime action in the Rashanar Battle Site. This is an inquiry to establish the facts of these tragic losses and to see if further action is required by this tribunal.”

He looked toward the prosecution table, and lights blinked cheerfully on the Medusan’s container. “Commodore Korgan, what is the finding you wish the tribunal to reach?”

Emery spoke confidently and said, “Starfleet will prove that Captain Jean-Luc Picard did with malice and aforethought cause an unprovoked attack on the vessel of a fellow Federation member. Since all hands were killed, we wish to petition the court to pursue a charge of murder for theVuxhal crew. Also dereliction of duty for failing to prevent an earlier Androssi attack on theJuno and for failing to aid theJuno when she was under attack by angry Ontailians.”

Ross sighed heavily and asked, “What evidence do you wish to present to support these petitions?”

“We have a vidlog of the destruction of theVuxhal, wreckage from theVuxhal, the pertinent logs and reports of Captain Leeden, Captain Picard, and other senior officers. We will also present testimony from Ontailians who observed the attack from nearby ships, and ofEnterprise crew members Dr. Crusher, Commander La Forge, and Commander Data. Our first witness is Counselor Colleen Cabot, who has evaluated Captain Picard over the last two days at Medical Mental Health.”

Picard leaned back in his seat, realizing he was going to be here a long time, and very little of it was going to be pleasant.

 

“In your opinion, Counselor Cabot,” asked Emery, “is Captain Picard fully competent to undergo these proceedings and any further actions this tribunal may choose to pursue?”

“He is competent,” answered the attractive counselor, who looked at Jean-Luc for the first time since entering the court.

“Does he understand the charges which may be leveled against him?”

Colleen pursed her lips, and Picard wondered why she was hesitant. “No, sir, he does not,” she answered, “because Captain Picard believes that he didnot destroy theVuxhal. Whether he clings to delusion or fact, I don’t think he’ll ever accept the court’s contention that he destroyed theVuxhal.”

Picard relaxed a bit, because at least that much was true. Nechayev wrote notes with a stylus on her padd.

Emery plunged onward. “Was he in sound mind from May eighth to May fifteenth, when he was serving in Rashanar and these events occurred?”

“All indications are that he was,” she answered.

“In your experience, how would you characterize Captain Picard’s mental state now?”

Cabot lifted her delicate chin to say, “He is suffering from grief, guilt, and low-grade depression, all of which are understandable. He makes a valiant effort to maintain his good humor.”

“Is he fit to serve now?” asked Emery.

“Objection,” Nechayev blurted. “May we approach the bench?”

Admiral Ross waved her off. “I was just going to overrule that myself. It goes to the matter of this inquiry. If there are no objections, I’m going to dismiss the counselor for now.”

Nechayev shook her head, and Emery concentrated for a moment before he said, “No objections, sir.”

As Colleen Cabot walked out the door without looking at him, Nechayev leaned close to whisper, “It was interesting what she did for you just now. I’ll tell you later.”

“Your Honors,” said Commander Emery, bowing to the admirals, “I would like to enter into evidence Captain Leeden’s and Captain Picard’s logs and messages to Starfleet during this time period.”

Ross turned to Nechayev and said, “If there are no objections.”

“Only that I would also like to include subspace messages sent directly between Captain Leeden and Captain Picard,” replied Nechayev.

The dickering over the evidence seemed to go on forever. Long passages from messages were read into the official transcript. Once again, Picard had to relive the string of ignominies he had suffered in the Rashanar Battle Site. It began with theCalypso being hijacked right from under his nose while they were exploring theAsgard. It went downhill during the encounter with the antimatter asteroid, when they had reported that an Ontailian ship had been lost, only to have the Ontailians deny it. There were endless encounters with scavengers, most of which resulted in no arrests but considerable damage to shuttlecraft and escorts. Deadly blasts from energy spikes, dramatic rescues, and much spinning of wheels—it was all rehashed in messages dating from the time, which seemed so long ago but was only a few days.

The final chapters began with the ill-fated adventures of the shuttlecraftHudson. The messages showed a dawning realization of the scope of the Androssi raid, interspersed with the separate rescues of La Forge and Data. When Picard allowed the Androssi who rescued Data to escape, that elicted an avalanche of frantic messages from Leeden. In her account, they had failed to chase the Androssi convoy, which allowed the scavengers to fire upon theJuno and disable her. The only lull in the storm was when both ships had paused to make repairs on theJuno. Meanwhile, the Ontailians were heavily involved in the hunt for Androssi scavengers.

Picard listened intently to messages about the disputed destruction of theVuxhal, and the very real destruction of theJuno. He saw members of the tribunal wincing at times. He wanted to shout at them that this was a compression of events; at the time no one knew that everything was spinning out of control. Chaos was the natural condition at Rashanar. Worse yet, there was very little in the disjointed narrative of the reports that showed the mimic ship could be real. Thus far, it seemed like a dubious explanation for a lot of unexplainable phenomena.

He was beginning to realize why Admiral Nechayev was worried.

At long last, they had a meal break, but the respite was brief. When they got back from lunch, the new, larger viewscreen was activated. Picard really didn’t want to watch what was probably coming up—the bridge record of them firing on the duplicateVuxhal. You’re going out of sequence, he wanted to tell them, but he knew that vidlogs carried a lot of weight in Starfleet investigations. Because they automatically recorded in key areas of the ship, they could be taken at face value and were tough to discredit. Much of his future depended upon what the tribunal saw…and how they perceived it.

As the log played, Picard felt as if he were watching an ancient silent movie. He tuned out all the exposition from the lawyers and even the words spoken by himself and his crew. He could remember the actions and the emotions he was feeling as if it were yesterday. He knew every unfolding of the narrative as if he had written it, rather than lived it. Every now and then, audible portions shot into his consciousness:

Data gasping out loud and saying, “Captain, there it is—the replica of theVuxhal.”

Everything that came next made it clear to Picard that theEnterprise had tried to hail the pursuing ship and tried to escape from them. But their maneuverability inside the graveyard was extremely limited. He saw Admiral Nakamura squirm a bit and Admiral Paris frown deeply in thought.

“You’re sure that’s the mimic ship?” asked a voice he recognized as his own. “There can’t be any mistake.”

“Thatis the duplicate!” On the video, Data jumped to his feet. “Captain, I advise you to destroy it. Do not let it get close to us, or theEnterprise will be like all these other derelicts…dead bodies and smashed circuits.”

The captain ordered, “Data, turn off your emotion chip.”

The android cocked his head, looked visibly calmer, and dropped his hand. “I have done so. Is that better?”

After that, Data had been himself, but it was a compelling moment in the log.It’s true, thought the captain,my entire defense hinges on the fact that I believed Data—even when he had been damaged and was emotional. The only way I have to save myself is to destroy Data, and they would let me do it.

“Data, target a brace of quantum torpedoes,” ordered his video image from the past.

“Yes, sir,” the android answered, his fingers a blur on his console. “Ready, sir.”

“Fire!” roared the captain.

It’s clear from the log that whatever was pursuing us, I shot and hit it,Picard decided.There’s no debate about that. So what wasthat ship?

Picard was thinking so hard that he almost missed the actual destruction of theVuxhal. The tribunal watched in stunned silence as the elegant spacecraft blew apart, followed by interference and static that obscured the image on the viewscreen.

If there was any mercy in the universe, the record should have ended there, but the worst was yet to come. First Leeden screamed at him about overreacting and for firing on a friendly ship. To him, it seemed as if the Ontailians overreacted, but perhaps that was his lack of knowledge about them. If they had been talking about Klingons, he could well imagine instant retaliation after seeing their flagship destroyed.

In truth, the retaliation wasn’t instant, because Leeden had thought she could negotiate with the Ontailians. While theEnterprise crew waited on the bridge, Counselor Troi made a profound statement on the video log:

“It must have been like this during the Battle of Rashanar,” said Troi. “The doppelgänger caused mistaken identity…deadly hostilities…vengeance with no thought of surrender. Ships were disabled by the force beam. Whole crews died while they were unconscious. No wonder there was no record of all this.”

Is anyone listening?Picard wanted to scream at the admirals.

The attack on theJuno took them all by surprise, both the people on the vidlog and the ones watching it in the courtroom. Despite the entrance of theEnterprise into the melee, all four Ontailian ships pounded away at the haplessJuno. Before they could do anything to help, theJuno broke apart.

When the record ended, Admiral Ross wisely asked for a short recess before they continued. During the break, Picard turned to Nechayev, smiled wanly, and said, “So I should have taken the deal, right?”

“Right,” muttered the admiral. “I’ve seen the log before. Every time I see it, I draw the same conclusion. Your defense rests on this doppelgänger being real, but the only proof you have is Data’s testimony. Unfortunately, that’s like having Bigfoot as your star witness.”

Picard frowned. “I thought the Ontailians were supposed to present physical evidence…wreckage from theVuxhal.”

“They claim they couldn’t find any,” answered Nechayev. “They say an antimatter pack from one of the graveyard ships must have come through there and destroyed the wreckage. Believe me, I intend to ask them about it, because the lack of evidence from theVuxhal weakens their case.”

“Then again,” said the captain, “an antimatter pack could completely obliterate any debris, and we often encountered them in the graveyard.”

“I was afraid you would say that.” The admiral sighed and looked down at her notes. “It helps, but there isn’t much we can do to refute the log. At least yourpretty counselor friend did you a possible favor.”

“What did she do?” asked Picard, thinking Cabot’s testimony had been fairly accurate.

Nechayev lowered her voice to say, “She didn’t give you an entirely clean bill of mental health. She made it sound as if you’re a bit obsessed with this mimic ship and that you would never admit you’re wrong. Ross let the inquiry continue, so he gave me a possible avenue to appeal the findings.”

“You mean argue that I reallyam crazy,” muttered Picard.

“Well, it’s not a perfect plan B,” admitted Nechayev, sitting back in her chair. “Besides, they will probably try to discredit Data.”

“Why?” asked Picard angrily.

“Because he has no constituency,” answered the admiral. “There’s no planet of androids who might threaten to leave the Federation. No Android Council members. It’s the way a trial goes—aim for the most vulnerable spot. Besides, everything about Rashanar is murky. I’ve seen that video log a number of times, and you lived through it—and I still can’t figure out exactly what happened. The tribunal has a rough job and only complicated, bad options from which to choose. The tribunal is going to start looking for an easy solution.”

Nechayev tapped her chin thoughtfully and said, “I intend to portray the Androssi as the main bad guys here. They were the spark that set off the forest fire, and they aren’t here to defend themselves.”

“They didn’t destroy theJuno or theVuxhal,” said Picard, “although it wasn’t for lack of trying. We should investigate the three ships of theirs that were destroyed in this action.”

“Every new detail makes the situation murkier,” Nechayev pointed out.

 

“For our first witness, we’d like to call Dr. Beverly Crusher,” announced Commander Emery.

Although Beverly glanced at Picard on her way to the witness stand, she was careful not to smile or act overly friendly toward him. With her most professional demeanor, she answered questions about the paralysis Picard had suffered when he was gassed by the Androssi who stole theCalypso. There was no sugar-coating the fact that he had been physically incapacitated by the muscle toxin, and he might have died if not for the quick arrival of La Forge and Data, followed by a shuttlecraft that had already been dispatched from theEnterprise.

“You did not personally see Captain Picard in this condition, did you?” asked Emery.

“No,” admitted Crusher. “He came to me afterward.”

Emery asked sharply, “How many hours had elapsed after this incident before Captain Picard came to you to be examined?”

“Approximately eight hours,” she answered truthfully.

Emery paused to get prompting from the Medusan in the container beside him, then asked, “Isn’t that highly unusual, not to see a patient for eight hours after he was paralyzed and nearly died? You castigated the captain for taking so long to see you, didn’t you?”

“Yes,” she answered, “but he had gone to see Captain Leeden and done other—”

Emery cut her off. “So, Dr. Crusher, is it accurate to say that you were unable to observe any of the actual short-term effects of the Androssi muscle toxin on Captain Picard, because he reported to you so long after the incident?”

“That’s accurate,” she answered, casting her eyes downward.

Lights on the Medusan’s box blinked, and Emery asked, “Upon returning to Earth, did you deliver pathology on the Androssi muscle toxin to Dr. Yerbi Fandau of Starfleet Medical?”

“Yes,” replied Crusher, sounding relieved to change the subject from Picard’s dubious behavior.

Emery lifted a padd and said, “With the tribunal’s permission, I would like to read into the record the conclusion reached by Dr. Fandau of Starfleet Medical.”

“Permission granted,” replied Admiral Ross.

The commander read aloud, “The Androssi neuro-muscular toxin, dimafluerine-narcosomatic, is a powerful and dangerous substance that induces in a human being a total body paralysis for a duration of ten minutes to permanent. It is not unlike the toxin of a puffer fish, which has been known to cause a condition that resembles death. If the lungs and heart were paralyzed, it would cause death in some individuals. Although the short-term effects of this toxin are easily observable, the long-term effects cannot be established without considerable testing on volunteer subjects.”

Emery sighed after his reading and asked, “Is there anything in Dr. Fandau’s conclusion you wish to dispute?”

“No,” muttered Beverly.

The tall commander smiled. “Then quite frankly, Doctor, you were unable to study either the short-term effects or long-term effects of this toxin on Captain Picard. You have no idea what it did to him, do you?”

“Objection,” said Admiral Nechayev.

“I withdraw the question,” said Emery, having made his point. “Your witness, Admiral.” Looking smug and satisfied, the prosecutor took a seat beside his superior, Commodore Korgan.

Admiral Nechayev rose to her feet and asked, “Dr. Crusher, how long have you known Jean-Luc Picard?”

That brought a smile to the beleaguered doctor’s face. “Twenty-eight years,” she answered proudly, “serving with him for twelve years.”

“And you have no doubt observed him under many circumstances and conditions,” said Nechayev. “You have treated him for illness and injury numerous times.”

“Oh, yes,” she answered.

“Have you ever classified Captain Picard as unfit for duty?”

“Yes, a few times.”

“In your opinion, was Captain Picard incapacitated or unfit for duty when you examined him after theCalypso was stolen?”

“No,” answered Crusher forcefully.

Nechayev nodded gratefully. “Thank you, Doctor. No more questions.”

 

“Next we would like to call to the stand Commander Geordi La Forge,” intoned Commander Emery.

La Forge was on the stand a long time. The first part of his testimony centered on their exploration of the derelict starshipAsgard and the subsequent hijacking of the yachtCalypso. This account brought nothing new for anyone to chew on, thought Picard, as theCalypso incident had been rehashed ad nauseam. Commander Emery asked forthright questions without much bias. The story came out fairly accurately, the captain decided.

The latter part of La Forge’s testimony focused on the misadventures of the shuttlecraftHudson. He related how he and Data had spent hours searching for the Androssi ship that supposedly fired on theJuno, chasing her around the dangerous center of the graveyard. They had played cat-and-mouse with each other, alternating among acting dead, hiding among the wrecks, and sudden bursts of frantic chase. La Forge drove home how unreliable sensor readings were in the middle of the boneyard, but he stressed that they could pick up impulse engines firing, at least enough to keep the chase going.

TheHudson crew hadn’t been entirely sure the vessel they were chasing was the stolenCalypso. They feared they had lost it until they stumbled upon not oneCalypso buttwo. Once again, Emery and his Medusan master did a good job of eliciting the facts. The engineer told about the added photon torpedoes on theCalypso, the new paint, and new name,Tempo, and how they were astounded to see that the ships were identical down to these small details. Finally Geordi related how the shuttlecraft and everything in it, including Data, went dead before they could form any conclusions.

“There was a high-pitched whine,” said Geordi, wincing at the memory, “and it caused me to black out. But I managed to put on my environmental suit before I did. That protected me from the cold, and there was air in the shuttle.”

Emery nodded sympathetically and said with concern, “How ‘dead’ was Commander Data?”

Geordi swallowed uncomfortably and answered, “He was frozen in his last position. There was no internal activity—at least to my normal observation. Since the other systems on the shuttle were dead, too, I reached that conclusion quickly.”

Emery nodded. “You have deactivated Commander Data a number of times for maintenance and repair, have you not?”

“Yes,” answered La Forge, and Picard could tell he hated talking about his friend as if he were a machine. Admiral Nakamura leaned forward to listen, and his face was an inscrutable blank.

“So Commander Data was as broken as he could be without being disassembled?”

“Yeah, I guess so,” muttered Geordi. “But unlike a human being, Data can be reborn as good as new.”

Emery smiled and closed his eyes to communicate with Commodore Korgan. Then he said, “Your own optical implants malfunctioned at the same time, did they not? That made you effectively blind.”

La Forge heaved a sigh and answered, “Yes.”

Emery circled around the table and asked, “You were rescued a few minutes later still inside the shuttlecraftHudson, but Data was not with you. Is that right?”

“That’s right.”

“So you were unconscious, the shuttlecraft was dead, and Commander Data was inert. Do you know how Data got out of the shuttlecraft?”

“No clue. Neither had anyone else,” answered the engineer.

Emery turned to the tribunal. “The details of Commander La Forge’s rescue are to be found in First Officer Riker’s log, exhibit eighteen. Commander Riker is currently acting captain of theEnterprise. We didn’t wish to call him away from his duties. To summarize, theHudson was found with all video and sensor logs erased, also it was in the vicinity of wreckage from theCalypso. The yacht was destroyed by unknown forces. Do you concur with that summation, Commander La Forge?”

“Yes.”

“Did Riker find the wreckage of one yacht or two yachts?” asked Emery.

“One,” admitted La Forge reluctantly.

Emery nodded sagely and seemed to be listening to a distant voice. “In your report you ventured the theory that one of the identical yachts you saw could have been a holographic illusion? Or some other mechanical illusion?”

“Objection,” said Admiral Nechayev. “Conclusion of the witness.”

“The commander is the most experienced engineer in Starfleet,” answered Ross. “I’ll let him answer that.”

“It could have been,” agreed La Forge.

“And the Androssi have been known to fool us before, have they not?”

“Yes,” murmured La Forge.

Emery concluded, “So we have no proof there were two yachts and no idea how theCalypso was destroyed. We also don’t know how Commander Data came to be where he was later discovered, but we do know that he was malfunctioning. Is that a fair assessment, Commander La Forge?”

“Yes, it is.” The engineer bowed his head sadly.

 

“We wish to call Commander Data to the stand,” announced Commander Emery.

The android was ushered in to take the hot seat. He was the only one in the courtroom who wasn’t nervous about it. Even the Medusan, Korgan, seemed hesitant. He took longer to converse telepathically with Emery. The tribunal members—Ross, Paris, Nakamura—were cordial toward the android, but Picard realized that none of them actually knew Data very well.

Under questioning, Data corroborated Geordi’s accounts of the actions on theAsgard when theCalypso had been hijacked. Obviously, he couldn’t add much information about the encounter with the twinCalypso s and his subsequent deactivation. He didn’t know how he had ended up floating in space. Emery wouldn’t allow the android to express his theory that the mimic ship had taken him from the shuttlecraft, examined him, and found him to be uninteresting. Since this contention couldn’t be proven, it wasn’t a terrible oversight, thought Picard.

Unfortunately, there was very little in Data’s testimony that could be proven. He was the only one who had seen the mimic ship paralyze and replicate the Ontailian heavy cruiserVuxhal. He was the only one who had seen theVuxhal spontaneously destruct after the mimic ship had turned into a reasonable copy of it. By his own admission, he continued to black out periodically while he floated in space, and he had memory loss akin to amnesia.

“You were malfunctioning, weren’t you?” asked Emery.

“Yes,” admitted Data. “I also relived memories from my past as my positronic brain attempted to do a memory update of my neural network.”

“Would you normally trust your observations during a time when you are malfunctioning?” asked Emery.

“No,” answered Data, “but I eventually recovered all of my short-term memory loss and was functioning as normal.”

Emery shook his head with disbelief. “After what you’d been through, how would you know if you were functioning normally?”

Data turned to the panel. “I performed my self-diagnostics.”

“Didn’t you do something else too, Commander?” asked the prosecutor. “Didn’t you activate your emotion chip?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Activating my emotion chip puts me in touch with those areas of reasoning beyond mere logic, such as intuition,” answered Data. “I was confounded by a situation I could not solve logically. I was spiraling toward the gravity dump and the vortex of debris.”

The prosecutor paused to listen to the Medusan in the box, and he nodded. “Would you activate your emotion chip for the tribunal?”

Nechayev sprang to her feet and barked, “I object!”

“Overruled,” replied Ross thoughtfully. “The entire rationale for theEnterprise firing on theVuxhal is fear over this mimic ship. The validity of that hinges on Data’s competence during the time he formed his theory. Activate the chip, Commander.”

Data cocked his head slightly and said, “Emotions are activated.”

Emery closed his eyes, getting his instructions. He finally said, “Isn’t it true, Commander Data, that you stole the emotion chip from your brother Lore after you killed him?”

“I object,” said Nechayev vociferously. “No one is on trial here, least of all Commander Data.”

“I am asking for the origin of the emotion chip,” insisted Emery. “Commander, you took the emotion chip out of your duplicate, Lore, before you dismembered him, correct?”

Nobody breathed in the courtroom, and Data seemed to be struggling with the answer. “We had to dismantle him—he was defective.”

Emery strutted before the tribunal, pointing to Data. “Lore had the emotion chip, but he was defective. However, whenyou use the emotion chip—even while you’re in a damaged state—you’re perfectly fine! Is this what you want the tribunal to believe?”

Data hesitated. “I…I believe I am fine.”

“Why don’t you use the emotion chip all the time?” asked Emery. Captain Picard cringed, because there was no good answer to that question.

“There are times I wish to be more efficient,” answered the android.

“Hmmmm,” said Emery. “So the emotion chip makes you inefficient and possibly psychotic, like your duplicate, Lore?”

“He is not my duplicate,” insisted Data as Admiral Nechayev leaped out of her seat to object.

Emery waved her off and said, “We’ll get back to the case. Commander Data, you have stated that theVuxhal was actually destroyed by an unexplained anomaly near the middle of the Rashanar Battle Site. Is that correct?”

“Yes, it is,” answered the android.

“Can you give us the coordinates where you say theVuxhal was destroyed, and can we find it there?”

“Not precisely,” answered the android. “By now, that wreckage has been pulled into the vortex.”

“So there is no actual proof you can give the tribunal to refute what the Ontailians are about to testify?”

“No,” answered Data glumly.

Emery nodded confidently. “No more questions for Commander Data. He may turn off his emotion chip now, if he wishes to be more efficient.”

Admiral Nechayev questioned Data and got a good account of the transformation of the mimic ship into theVuxhal. Dispassionately, Data told of the destruction of theVuxhal and his daring rescue from the derelict in which he had taken refuge. Data admitted that he had asked his superiors not to fire at the Androssi salvage vessel that had saved him, but explaining that one minor infraction didn’t negate all the larger ones.

Data’s story still hung together for Picard, but he couldn’t tell how many others in the room had been swayed. They respected Data, but he wasn’t their shipmate, an officer they trusted with their lives every single day of the week. This fateful event had just been one of countless occasions when Picard had based his actions on Data’s word. He would do it again tomorrow.

The Ontailians followed Data to the stand and presented their own logs and visuals of theEnterprise firing upon the heavy cruiser. Under Emery’s gentle questioning, they insisted they thought they were under attack when they turned on theJuno. After all, they had been battling scavengers all day, and some of those looters had been disguised as Starfleet vessels. The destruction of theVuxhal right before their eyes left them no choice.

When Admiral Nechayev rose to cross-examine her first Ontailian witness, she asked, “Where is the physical evidence? If theVuxhal was destroyed near buoy twenty-five, why weren’t you able to recover any wreckage?”

“First, we were involved in an action with theEnterprise,” answered the mechanical voice of the universal translator. “Then the aberrant antimatter pack swept through the area and dissolved all traces of the wreckage. At least that is our theory. We were unable to enter the area for several hours.”

“That’s awfully convenient, isn’t it,” remarked Nechayev snidely.

“May it please the court,” interrupted Emery, “no one has produced any wreckage of theVuxhal —from either the middle or the outer part of Rashanar. We can name dozens of vessels which vanished there without a trace.”

“That says something about Rashanar, doesn’t it?” she added. “No further questions.”

The hearing room had been reduced to a somber hush, and whispers sounded like shouts. It was the third day of the inquiry, but for Picard it was beginning to seem like one night’s long nightmare.

 

Appearing last, Captain Picard took the stand and answered all of Admiral Nechayev’s questions as truthfully as he could. The prosecution refused to ask the captain any questions at all.Why should they risk showing me disrespect, thought Picard,when they have their case sewed up?

He could do little but say, “Yes, I believed Data, and I did everything I could to help theJuno.” As Counselor Cabot had predicted, he wouldn’t be shaken from his belief in the mimic ship.

As she had also predicted, the result was a foregone conclusion. Admirals Ross, Nakamura, and Paris went into seclusion for about an hour and emerged looking grim-faced. They sat at the dais, and the sergeant-at-arms called for the room to come to order.

The court fell into a hush, as Admiral Ross folded his hands in front of him. Somberly he intoned, “The tribunal has reached a preliminary finding on this matter. After hearing and reading the testimony presented, we find that Captain Picard acted negligently in not doing more to prevent this tragedy. That is our only finding at this time, but there may be further action in the future. Until our final determination, Captain Picard will be remanded to the custody of Starfleet Medical Mental Health. This hearing is dismissed.”

There were a few gasps from the gallery, but neither Picard nor Nechayev was surprised. Captain Picard felt a pat on his back. He turned around to see unassuming Ensign Brewster, who looked crestfallen. “It isn’t over yet,” whispered the aide.

“What does this mean?” the captain asked a thoughtful Admiral Nechayev.

“It means you were found negligent,” she answered.

The admiral bolted from her chair, a look of determination on her pinched face. “Give me a little time to see what I can do, and I’ll visit you tonight after dinner. I’ll make sure you won’t spend much time in the holding cell, Jean-Luc, but go along for now.”

“Thank you,” replied Picard, although he wasn’t in a very thankful mood. He felt a tug on his arm, and he knew it was time to go with those whom he had grown to think of as his jailers. If they thought he had felt helpless in Rashanar, they were wrong, because now he really felt helpless.