"I'm going to miss this ship. She went before her time."
"Someone once told me that time is a predator that stalks us all our lives. I rather believe that time is a companion who goes with us on the journey, and reminds us to cherish every moment," Riker listened as Picard studied the front of the photo album he was holding, a small smile tugging at his lips, "...because they'll never come again. ...What we leave behind is not as important as how we lived. ...After all, Number One, we're only mortal."
Riker smiled back at his captain wryly. Speak for yourself, sir. I plan to live forever," Riker looked around the shattered bridge sadly, "I always thought I'd get a shot at this chair one day."
Will Riker had never forgotten the last conversation he'd had on the bridge of the Enterprise D before he and Jean-Luc had beamed onboard the Valiant; and even now, he still felt a great deal of guilt that the fabled Galaxy-class starship had been lost on his watch during that nasty business with the Duras sisters.
Lursa and B'tor.
Riker missed neither of them, but then again after seeing the chaos which had been caused by Duras, who had likely planned on some kind of Civil War within the Empire to wrestle control from the High Council, and bring forth the Romulan alliance even without Worf killing him out of revenge for what he'd done to K'Ehyler. The two Klingon sisters had been responsible for so much grief during the Klingon Civil War, and their alliance with the Romulans had caused many problems with the balance of power. Only their allies would miss them.
Will had loved the Enterprise-D, and he missed her greatly; while he had loved the Enterprise-E, it was not the same. But after all of this chaos with the changeling infiltration and the discovery of the Borg, and the simultaneous loss of Ro Laren, the discovery of the conspiracy, the sudden assimilation of so many young kids, including Geordi's daughters, Riker had expected so much more, but he was stunned to see the Enterprise D.
The saucer was slightly scarred after the way it skidded to a halt on Veridian 3, but the sight of it being mounted on a brand new secondary hull almost brought tears to his eyes, and he wished Starfleet had simply recovered the saucer from Veridian 3, and restored the ship and equipped it with a new star drive section instead of turning over a fresh leaf by releasing the Enterprise E.
Riker had felt like crying and laughing at the same time.
He was stunned and wondered what had inspired Geordi to rebuild the Enterprise D; 20 years was a long time and he wondered how much effort and what kind of favours his old friend had needed to pull to get everything sorted out.
Building the secondary hull wasn't difficult considering several Galaxy-Class ships would have been scrapped and sent to the mothball yards unless, of course, Geordi had a new one built from scratch although that was a stretch. He had every faith in Geordi's work, knowing how much of a perfectionist his old friend was.
When the shuttle docked, Riker was amazed like everyone else when they saw just how much effort Geordi and his team had gone through to make it feel like nothing had changed, and the original secondary hull of the Enterprise hadn't been destroyed by that warp core breach, but the biggest surprise was the bridge. The last time Riker had seen the Enterprise-D's bridge, it had been shattered; but somehow Geordi had recovered the original bridge module. Riker was delighted with that, he had preferred the original module even if he had just started to become used to the new module with its new apps and new consoles along the sides of the bridge, granting more facilities and improvements to the bridge operations. But this was much better. When they resumed their old places, Riker felt better; he'd loved being a captain, but at heart, he had always enjoyed sitting next to Captain Picard.
Now, they had to save the Federation, and for the first time, he was confident they could win.
And now, he, Deanna, Worf, Geordi, Beverly, Data, and Jean-Luc were going to win.