"It is the opinion of this tribunal, after careful investigation of the events at Galvan VI, that neither Captain David Gold nor any member of the crew of the U.S.S. da Vinci is in any way culpable for the deaths of twenty-three members of the ship's complement, and that those deaths, while tragic and most lamentable, were in the line of duty. Starfleet considers this matter officially closed." Admiral William Ross looked down from the dais at David Gold. "You're free to return to duty, Captain."

Gold, who was standing before the raised wooden platform in Starfleet Headquarters in San Francisco, said, "Thank you, Admiral."

Sitting between Ross and Captain Montgomery Scott, Admiral Sitak said calmly, "These proceedings have concluded. Dismissed." He then clanged the bell on the dais once.

The declaration and the bell were both formalities. There was no one present besides the three line officers and Gold himself, the former sitting behind the raised wooden desk and in front of the large blue-and-white Federation flag. Gold had requested that the session be private. He saw no reason for the rest of the surviving crew of the da Vinci to sit through this, nor did he feel spectators were appropriate. As captain, it was his responsibility and his alone -- if any punishment were to be meted out, he would be the only one to accept it. The rest of them have been through enough.

Both Ross and Sitak rose and departed the room quickly, but Scotty approached Gold, who hadn't moved despite his dismissal. "Are y'all right, David?" the older man asked solemnly.

"No. For starters, I'm still getting used to this thing." He held up the biosynthetic left hand that replaced his original, lost -- along with so much else -- at Galvan VI. "It looks and behaves just like the original -- hell, it even has that liver spot on my knuckle -- but it feels wrong." Gold let out a long sigh. "And then there's the whole matter of half my crew's being dead."

Scotty put a hand on Gold's shoulder. "David, lad, you cannot blame yourself."

"Someone else I should blame? I'm the captain, Scotty. You know as well as I do where that particular buck stops." He shook his head. "If I'd just done something different--"

Waving an admonishing index finger at Gold, Scotty said, "None of that, now. You start playin' 'what if' games, and you'll run around in circles till Doomsday."

"I know, I know, but if I hadn't moved the da Vinci closer to the Orion maybe--"

"Maybe the Orion would've hit the da Vinci at such an angle that it would have ripped your ship in twain and you'd all be dead instead of just twenty-three of you."

Gold fixed Scotty with an incredulous look. "You can't assume that."

"You're right, I can't. So why're you?" Scotty asked.

Closing his eyes, Gold said, "I can't believe I fell for that. I must be getting old."

"No, you're tired. And I don't blame you. Come on, lad, I'll walk you out."

Scotty led Gold out of the hearing room. As they proceeded down the corridor, the old engineer said, "I recall something Dr. McCoy said once. Some young person asked him what he thought about death. Leonard looked him right in the eye and said, 'I'm against it.' "

Despite himself, Gold smiled. He had only met the aged Admiral McCoy a few times, most recently when the da Vinci brought the old Constitution-class U.S.S. Defiant home, but that certainly sounded like something he'd say. "Can't say I disagree." The smile fell. "Truth be told, I'm tired of it. One of my oldest friends died in a skirmish with the Klingons a few years back. I seriously thought about retiring then. Rachel talked me out of it -- but things haven't gotten any better. Salek and Okha died during the war, and 111 died right after it. My son Nate and his wife died when the Dominion took Betazed. A couple months ago, I was reunited with Gus Bradford just long enough to watch him die. And now this."

"Times like this," Scotty said, "I think about Matt Franklin. Good lad, Franklin. Young ensign in Starfleet, fine engineer, had a good career ahead of him. He was assigned to the Jenolen a few weeks before that ship was asked to escort some old relic to his retirement at the Norpin Colony."

Gold saw where this was going, but also knew better than to interrupt Scotty in mid-story.

"After the ship crashed, he and I were the only survivors. We worked out a way to preserve ourselves in the transporter buffer so as to not be usin' up all the life support. It almost worked."

"The fact that you're telling me this story means it did work," Gold said.

"I am. Franklin isn't. He didn't make it. His pattern degraded. Perhaps we could've done somethin' different. But we didn't, and Franklin died. A young man, his whole life ahead of him, doesn't live, while the old man on his way to retire does."

"You're saying I shouldn't let this bring me down?"

They arrived at the large entryway to Starfleet HQ. "I'm sayin' that life goes on, until it stops. Nothin' we can do about it, except to keep livin'. Until we stop."

"Can't argue with that," Gold said as the massive double doors parted, and the captain felt the cool breeze of a typically pleasant San Francisco afternoon brush against his face.

"About time you got out of there."

Gold blinked. He looked at the front steps leading up to HQ's entrance to see his oldest son Daniel and his wife, Jessica Silver, getting up from where they'd been sitting on the staircase. They were munching on sandwiches -- pastrami on rye bread, from the looks of it, which meant they'd been sent with a care package from Rachel -- but moved to greet Gold and Scotty as they came through the doors.

Daniel -- a tall, broad-shouldered man who had inherited his mother's brown eyes, his father's brown-gone-white-too-damn-fast hair, but was otherwise the spitting image of his uncle Adam, Gold's giant of a brother -- clasped his father in a warm embrace. "It's good to see you, Pop."

Gold sighed. "Don't call me 'Pop,' son."

Breaking the embrace and grinning widely, Daniel said, "Don't call me 'son,' Pop."

"You know," Jessica said, with a grin as wide as her husband's, "that routine wasn't funny the first eight thousand times, either."

"Like that's ever stopped anyone in this family," Gold said as he hugged his daughter-in-law. As short as Daniel was tall, Jessica's beautiful hair, which now matched her last name, was tied in a simple ponytail that stretched to the middle of her back. Usually she had it tied up in so elaborate a fashion that Gold wondered why she didn't just cut it and be done with it. As usual, she wore her massive gold hoop earrings with a Spican flame gem dangling inside the hoop. Daniel always said that her green eyes glowed more than the flame gems, and her smile glowed more than her eyes.

"You remember Montgomery Scott," Gold said quickly, indicating the captain.

"Of course," Daniel said. "It's good to see you again, Captain."

"Ach, it's 'Scotty,' like I told you last time. Has your mother tried the haggis recipe I gave her?"

Daniel and Jessica exchanged a nervous glance. Gold had to restrain himself from a chuckle. Scotty had gone to the house for dinner a few months back. Afterward, Scotty had asked Gold if his wife, Rachel Gilman -- one of the finest cooks on the East Coast -- had ever made haggis. Gold had thought Scotty was joking at the time. As if Rachel would ever let that in her kitchen...

"Not yet," Daniel said slowly.

Scotty laughed, which seemed to relieve the tension. "No surprise there." Sighing overdramatically, he added, " 'Tis an uphill battle, bringing the joys of fine cuisine to the heathens o' the galaxy."

In a mock aside, Gold said, "This from a man who drinks liquid peat bog -- on purpose."

Letting out a mock-indignant snort, Scotty said, "I'll leave you to it, lads -- and lass. David, I'll be in touch. We'll speak in a few days about the da Vinci repairs and, ah, personnel matters."

"Of course." That was a duty he was not looking forward to, but needed to be addressed sooner or later. Luckily, the da Vinci's extensive repair schedule -- the ship was all but being rebuilt from scratch -- meant it could be later. Still, at some point, twenty-three positions needed to be filled. Probably more than that, Gold thought solemnly. A disaster like this almost certainly meant that some crew members might be transferring or leaving Starfleet altogether.

Possibly even the CO. The thought came unbidden, and Gold banished it back to whatever nether region of his brain hatched it. Now was not the time to be making decisions like this.

He looked at his oldest son. Now is the time for family.

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