Chapter Eleven: Insubordination

I entered the shuttlecraft bay and saw the obstacle path that lay before me. There were at least three armed guards, but there were also large bins which I immediately sought to use to my advantage before…

"Can I help you?" asked a female guard. She was slender, dark-haired and about my height.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that the other two guards were preoccupied with their own conversation. Backing up slowly, I smiled and chuckled softly.

"My goodness, I'm really losing it today! I thought this was the holodeck; I must've gotten off on the wrong deck. Sorry for the inconvenience."

"Don't worry about it. It happened to me during my first year on the ship." The female officer smiled before affixing her face in a serious expression while raising an eyebrow, "Just don't let it happen again, you don't want people getting the wrong idea."

I nodded and made a half-turn, pretending like I was making an exit. When I saw that her back was turned, I reached into my waistband to retrieve the hypospray and pressed it against her neck, hoping she wouldn't scream or alarm the other officers. I gently lowered her unconscious body to the ground before scampering to hide behind one of the large bins. Realizing I was still unnoticed, I stealthily ran over to one of the shuttles and entered. I prayed that flying the real thing would be similar to the simulation on which I often practiced.

As I sat in the shuttle, I knew I didn't have much time to clear the ship before getting caught. However, there was one major detail I had overlooked. How the hell was I going to get the shuttle bay door open?! 'Crap!' I thought. Suddenly, I heard commotion from outside of the shuttle. Security was on to me and they were ordering me to get out the shuttle. The door was closed so I had time to figure something out… but not much! Using Commander Riker's manual authorization code, I entered a self-destruct sequence on the shuttle and prayed they wouldn't call my bluff. I had memorized it when I saw him enter it in one of the consoles one day. I almost got caught watching him. Keep in mind I didn't ever think I would use it, but I was desperate!

Based on the silence, I deduced the security team that had been outside of the shuttle had cleared away. The countdown sequence was down to three minutes when the shuttle bay door finally opened. I sighed with relief as I cleared the shuttle bay before disengaging the auto-destruct sequence. However, I had a gut feeling that it was all a bit too easy.

"Well, this is certainly not one of your better ideas!" Q chuckled.

I whipped my head around and saw him sitting in the co-pilot seat, dressed in a police uniform.

"What are you doing here?!"

"Trying to see what you're going to do next. Hopefully your next move will be smarter than this one!" Q replied snidely.

I then guided the shuttle around the Enterprise and headed towards the wormhole at top speed.

"Guess not." Q replied as he shook his head.

"Look, if you're not going to help me, then get out of my head!" I yelled.

"Come on Kadalynn, thinking I'm in your head makes about as much sense as thinking that you'd be able to pull this off." Q said and with a snap of a finger, he was gone.

The shuttle slowed dramatically before coming to a halt and hanging in space.

"No! Damn it!" I yelled as I began to frantically check the systems and saw that everything was operational. It wasn't until the shuttle began moving in reverse that I realized that the Enterprise was pulling me in with a tractor beam. Before I could do anything, I was beamed off the shuttle and directly onto the bridge.

"What the hell were you trying to pull?!" the captain asked angrily.

"I… I was just trying to go home, sir."

"Are you aware of the seriousness of what you have done?!"

"Yes, sir and I apologize. I…" my words were interrupted by a sharp rocking of the ship. Everyone gasped when they looked at the view screen and saw that the wormhole had collapsed. Tears filled my eyes when I realized that I would have been killed if I succeeded in my attempt.

"Well, Kadalynn, it seems that you can thank Cmdr. Data for saving your life once again. You can do so on your way to the brig." Capt. Picard said before nodding to Data, "Commander."

Never before had I seen such a livid expression on Data's face. He took my arm and guided me to the turbolift. Although he was obviously angry at me, he was still very gentle. However, he said nothing during our long walk to the brig.

"You haven't said a word to me since you left the bridge."

"What do you wish to talk about?" he asked flatly. Clearly the question was mainly rhetorical.

When we came to the cell, I panicked and grabbed his hand. He gently squeezed my hand for a brief moment before placing his hand on the small of my back to softly nudge me inside. After I turned to face him, he nodded to the guard, who activated the force field. The brief distortion the force field generated seemed to mock the emotional separation between me and Data.

"I'm so sorry, Data." I whispered, my voice cracking with sorrow.

"So am I." he said quietly before leaving.