“So what are you saying?” S’rrel demanded. “That we just do nothing about the risk of injury and death?”

“How much greater will the risk be if people panic? The public is still reeling from the Naazh crisis and that hullabaloo around the New Humans. They’re getting stirred up by fearmongers about Arcturian Augment shock troops, or whatever they’re claiming they are this week, being let into the Academy. They’ve lost enough faith in Starfleet’s ability to protect them. We don’t want to lose more face by admitting weakness.

“Sure, we could mobilize some massive emergency force here in the heart of the Federation, but that would just call attention to the fact that we have no plan beyond trying to clean up after the fact. And if that’s the best we can do anyway, then it makes little difference whether we mobilize or not.”

“It makes plenty of difference, Captain!” Cartwright’s fierce exclamation silenced Styles quite effectively. “Don’t be a fool. You know as well as anyone that lives depend on the speed and effectiveness of the response in the wake of a disaster.

“You’re concerned with Starfleet’s image? How good will we look after the fact if we failed to prepare for a threat we knew was coming? It’d be V’Ger all over again. Days of advance notice, and we couldn’t mobilize more than one capital ship to defend the heart of the Federation!” He shook his head. “We waited too long to rebuild the fleet after the Klingon Wars. We trusted too much in Earth’s defense grid to protect us, and V’Ger shut it down effortlessly.

“This time, we have weeks of advance warning. And we have more ships on hand in the home system now. So let’s use them the way they’re meant to be used.”

Chekov winced at the reminder of V’Ger. The admiral declined to mention that the powerful artificial intelligence had stolen the planetary defense grid’s shutdown codes from the Enterprise’s computer—a massive breach of security on Chekov’s first mission as that ship’s security chief. No matter how many people assured him that nobody could have prevented an entity of V’Ger’s immense power from doing what it wanted, his pride had never fully recovered.

Worse, it was a reminder that he felt just as helpless in the current crisis. As mysterious as V’Ger had been, at least they could see it and track its movements. At least it had been possible to confront it before it reached Earth and find some way to stop it. The vacuum flares were a more inchoate threat. After all these weeks, they were still stuck with reacting rather than anticipating.