INTO THE NEBULA Page 13

  “I know that, Will,” Troi said with a slight frown. “I didn’t say any of this made sense. I am simply reporting what I observed. I might be able to learn more if I could observe the two of them together some more.”

  “In that case,” Riker said with a slight shrug, “why don’t we take Koralus with us the next time we go down?”

  “An idea to consider, Number One,” Picard inter vened. “Counselor, what of President Khozak? What did his reactions tell you?”

  “Little more than I already reported, Captain. He knows no more about the Plague or the mines than he has said. He still greatly mistrusts us, perhaps even more than earlier. And having Koralus accompany us will almost certainly raise that level of distrust.”

  The discussion continued for several minutes. In the end, Picard decided to include Koralus in the group when they went down to brief Khozak and Zalkan the next day. Troi might indeed gain some useful information from Koralus’s and Zalkan’s reactions to each other, and information was one thing they were desperately in need of, as they often were. Besides, Khozak’s distrust of everyone from the Enterprise was already so great that the presence of Koralus could hardly make it worse. They would also ask Khozak to call together the entire Council, whose members might have a different perspective than either Khozak or Zalkan. In the meantime, Picard would contact Starfleet with the news of the dilithium.

  It should, he thought wryly, make their day.

  Data was at the ops console two hours later when another energy surge, the first in more than a day, was detected, this one relatively weak, more like the ones from the mine than the ones from space. The source was neither in space nor anywhere near either of the areas on Krantin where previous surges had been detected. Instead, it was in the vicinity of, if not actually within, the city. Data quickly noted the precise time and the necessarily imprecise location, then notified the captain in his ready room.

  Summoning an ensign to take the console, Data strode from the bridge as Picard entered. Minutes later, as he entered his quarters, he noted that Spot, while not hiding, still appeared uneasy, her eyes following him as he crossed the room to the viewscreen on his desk.

  “Computer, display on split screen the record of activity in these quarters and the quarters of Ensign Thompson for the period between twelve and ten minutes prior to the time of this command.”

  The screen sprang instantly to life, divided precisely down the middle. On the left, Spot lay curled on the heavily cushioned back of the couch, obviously one of her favorite spots, as indicated by the deep indentation she was half submerged in. On the right half of the screen, Fido, with markings similar to Spot’s but with hair twice as long, was stalking one of the lifelike mouse automatons that Data had designed and distributed to all interested cat owners on the Enterprise.

  On both screens, time displays silently counted down the minutes and seconds.

  At minus eleven minutes ten seconds, Spot’s eyes snapped open, followed a fraction of a second later by her tail stiffening and bristling. At eleven minutes nine seconds, Fido lurched to a halt in his pursuit of the mouse.

  At eleven minutes eight seconds, both let out a brief teeth-baring hiss and darted looks in all directions. The tails remained bushed out for several seconds before beginning to subside, first on Fido, then Spot. Both remained alert, even wary, for more than three minutes. Spot, still watching Data from her perch on the couch back, had laid her ears back as her own image had hissed at her from the screen but otherwise remained comparatively undisturbed.

  “Replay at one-tenth speed the period from eleven minutes twelve seconds to eleven minutes,” Data said.

  When he was through, Data was satisfied that the phenomenon he had suspected since the day before had been confirmed. Not only that, the computer records had pinned down some of the key parameters. Spot’s first reaction to the energy surge was three-point-one seconds before the Enterprise sensors had first detected it. With Fido in frantic motion, it was harder to pinpoint the precise time of his reaction, but it was at least two-point-two seconds before the sensors. Not surprisingly, their reactions to the energy surge from the city were substantially less severe than Spot’s earlier reaction to the much more powerful energy surge from space.

  As with every piece of information he encountered, Data filed these for future reference.

  Later that night, while Data observed Spot directly, she reacted minimally but unmistakably to a half-dozen energy surges even less powerful than the first. All, he discovered when he checked the computer log, were in or near the city. Space and the area around the mines remained inactive.

  Chapter Twelve

  IT TOOK ONLY MINIMAL LOBBYING on Picard’s part to convince a nondescript Starfleet admiral that the captain should be the one to head the next day’s away team despite regulations that ordinarily gave that duty to the first officer. It was not just that President Khozak, a putative head of state, was entitled to a “delegation” headed by the ranking officer, though that was the low-key argument that Picard made. It was simply that there were times—more of them than he liked to admit, even to himself—when he felt like getting off the bridge and out of the ready room. And away from the crew fitness reports, he told himself uneasily, which still were barely started.

  “As always, Jean-Luc, the decision is yours,” the admiral assured him in conclusion. “You’re the one on the scene. However, a suggestion: Whoever goes down, leave the phasers on the Enterprise.”

  With that not-quite-order, the distant image vanished, replaced momentarily by the Starfleet insignia. When Picard turned away, he saw Riker shaking his head disapprovingly.

  “No disrespect to Starfleet, Captain,” Riker said quietly, “but as the admiral said, you’re the one on the scene. And he wasn’t greeted at the airlock with drawn weapons the way we were.”

  “I understand your concern, Number One,” Picard said dryly, “but carrying weapons is not conducive to trust. And we will need all the help we can get in that respect when we tell them that we have, in effect, been holding out on them about what we discovered at the bottom of the mines yesterday.”

  Which, he realized even as he spoke, was the real reason he had decided to take Riker’s place. Another “obligation” of rank. If as captain he was responsible for withholding the information from Khozak, then he should now be responsible for so informing the president and taking whatever heat resulted.

  “In any event,” he went on, mentally filing the uncomfortable insight that had just come to him, “keeping the Enterprise in low orbit and maintaining a constant lock on our comm units strikes me as a more practical precaution than arming ourselves and hoping to shoot our way out of the middle of a sealed city with only one known exit.”

  Despite the field-effect suit he had activated as the shuttlecraft door opened, Picard felt like gasping for breath as he stepped out into Krantin’s hazy, poisonous atmosphere. Koralus, a comm unit attached to his tunic for the duration of their visit, stepped out after Picard, followed by Data and Troi.

  The Jalkor airlock was already open. Two of the same security officers who had escorted Riker’s group the first day were waiting just inside. This time their weapons were at least not drawn, Picard noted, though there was little other evidence of trust. As before, the group from the Enterprise was hustled into a large van, apparently electrically driven, with the triangular Security Force insignia on both sides.

  Picard had scanned the tricorder records and listened to Data’s descriptions of the two previous trips, and he realized almost immediately they must be taking a different route. The earlier parties had been taken through what Data had described as a large industrial district, in which the buildings extended all the way up to and sometimes through the surrounding city roof. This time the van rolled through an obviously different area, this one filled with two- and three-story buildings that had probably once been individual homes. The city roof here was several meters above the tops of the buildings, supported by feature
less metal or plastic columns, most of them ringed by glowing tubes. Several of the tubes, however, were dark, leaving the surrounding areas in a shadowy twilight. For one stretch of three or four kilometers, the individual buildings vanished, replaced by blocky, flat-roofed buildings hundreds of meters on a side. One of the surface hydroponics facilities they had detected from the shuttlecraft during the first trip down, Picard assumed.

  At one point, while passing through a stretch of windowless blocks a hundred meters high, he heard a series of faint, popping sounds which, he realized after a moment, were very probably the signature of projectile weapons similar to the ones the security officers carried. The driver darted a glance in the direction of the sounds, but the other guard either didn’t notice or ignored them. Picard couldn’t help but wonder uneasily if the distant shots had anything to do with the fact that they were taking a different route today.

  Except for a smaller version of the van they were in, also emblazoned with the Security Force insignia—heading in the direction of the shots? he wondered—Picard saw no direct evidence of the five million people who were supposed to still inhabit Jalkor, not even when they finally reached the canyons of what had been the heart of the city. It was as deserted as everything else.

  But the empty streets were understandable, he thought. Only the security forces and their quarry would be out and around, in what passed for “the open.” Most of the people still working to keep the city going were wherever the machinery was: out of sight.

  And those who weren’t working, those who had surrendered to despair and the computer fantasies . . .

  Suppressing a sigh, Picard could think only that Jalkor was fully as bleak and depressing as any city he had ever encountered. He had seen cities nearly destroyed by wars where the survivors had at least had enough hope and determination to show themselves in the streets. But perhaps this was worse than an ordinary war. Here the enemy could not be seen or fought. As far as these people knew, it simply existed—and had existed for hundreds of years and dozens of generations. And it could not be resisted, could not be struck out at. It was everywhere, literally a part of the air they had to breathe, unstoppable.

  He grimaced mentally. It was little wonder that, in the face of centuries of such seeming inevitability, the urge to retreat into computer-generated revenge fantasies was so great. Even the vandalism made a perverted kind of sense—if they couldn’t strike out at a real, visible enemy, they would strike out in their blind frustration and anger at whatever came to hand. Countless riots on dozens of worlds, including Earth, had been born out of less.

  Closing his eyes for a second and pulling in a breath, Picard forced such thoughts out of his mind and focused on what, in another few minutes, he must tell President Khozak.

  The van swooped down from the street level and deposited them in a mostly darkened parking area, where the only lights were those triggered sporadically by the group’s presence. After a brief, shuddering ride in an elevator, they were marching down a featureless corridor toward the Council Chambers.

  Raised voices were audible several meters before they reached the door, which the security officer opened for them before stepping to one side and gesturing them through. Inside, Picard recognized Khozak, Zalkan, and Denbahr standing with seven others around the conference table. All of the seven looked tired and harried and impatient to be somewhere else. The two who were speaking angrily to Khozak were as smudged and disheveled as Denbahr had been when Picard had first seen her on the link from the shuttlecraft, fresh from hours of maintenance work at the power plant. The subject, apparently, was a desperate need for more technicians to care for the decaying food-processing equipment.

  “Wake them up and shut off their terminals, Khozak!” the one, his back to the door, was saying loudly, his voice filling the sudden silence that fell as the others saw Picard leading the group into the room.

  Scowling, the speaker turned. The scowl lightened when he saw the group from the Enterprise, but it didn’t disappear entirely, and Khozak’s angry expression when he saw Koralus more than made up for it. Zalkan’s eyes widened briefly at the sight of Koralus, but beyond that there was no reaction.

  “So,” the man said after a second, “these are the miracle workers from the stars.”

  “They’ve already worked a small miracle in the power plant!” Denbahr snapped, apparently angered by the man’s tone. “They produced a functional laser confinement unit in a matter of hours and will have more for us in a few days. That’s obviously not the answer to all our problems, but at least it will give us breathing room.” She verbally lurched to a halt, glancing toward Picard and the others as she stepped back. “And they’ve only been here a couple of days,” she added quietly.

  “Technician Denbahr is correct,” Khozak said into the silence that followed Denbahr’s brief outburst. “They may also,” he went on, looking sternly around the group, “have discovered the source of the Plague.”

  For a full second, there was total silence, and it was all Picard could do to suppress an angry scowl at the melodramatic announcement. But he shouldn’t have been surprised by a grandstanding announcement like that from Khozak, he thought in exasperation.

  Then all seven were talking at once, some directing their questions at Khozak, others at the group from the Enterprise. Khozak held up his hands and shouted for quiet, then pounded solidly on the table with a gavel-like object. Finally, silence returned.

  Solemnly, Khozak introduced the seven, all members of the Council, all obviously impatient to get through the formalities. Then he announced the names of Picard, Data, Troi, and “the Deserter Koralus.”

  Picard was relieved to see that there was none of the reaction that Khozak had obviously expected to Koralus’s name. Instead, the Council members barely glanced at him while Delmak, the original speaker, didn’t even do that.

  “Is it true?” Delmak demanded, turning his frown from Khozak, at whom he had been directing it throughout the introductions, to Picard. “Do you know what caused the Plague?”

  “We have discovered a clue to the nature of the Plague,” Picard said slowly and deliberately, trying not to return the frown, “and we have encountered some ships that may have some connection with the Plague. So far—”

  Another eruption of everyone speaking at once cut off Picard’s words. This time it was Delmak who restored order.

  “Ships?” The anger was obvious in his voice. “Are you saying that the Plague is not a natural phenomenon? That the revenge fantasies are true and someone is causing it?”

  “Not at all. What we are saying is—” Picard broke off deliberately, his eyes moving from Khozak to each Council member in turn. The silence held.

  “What I am saying is this,” he resumed. “Let us tell you precisely what we have found, and you can draw your own conclusions.”

  Everyone nodded or muttered assent, and Picard began. With questions and other interruptions, however, it took nearly an hour to get to the point at which the mines had been entered. Khozak himself took over then with his account of the discovery of the mysterious recent activity in the mines. “I have already alerted several of my best security officers to be prepared to descend as far as necessary to determine what the intruders were—or are—doing there. I trust you have no objections, Captain Picard?” Khozak concluded.

  Again Picard suppressed a frown. “I would not advise a course of action like that at this point, President Khozak,” he said uncomfortably. “Before you make any decisions, you should be aware of a number of things. First, the most recent energy surges detected by our sensors originated neither in space nor in the vicinity of the mines but somewhere in or near Jalkor.”

  “Where?” Khozak demanded, his frown returning. “In what part of the city?”

  Picard shook his head slightly. “It is impossible to tell. As I said, we are not even positive that they originated within the city. Neither do we know whether the surges indicated the arrival of something—or someone—or
the departure.”

  “How many were there?” Zalkan, completely silent until now, spoke up.

  “Seven, I believe.” Picard glanced at Data, who nodded. “Seven. Does the number of surges mean anything to you, Zalkan?”

  The scientist shook his head vigorously. “I was merely thinking that, if there were several, it is possible that someone observed at least one of them. Is it safe to assume that these surges, like the ones related to the disappearance of the ships that you showed us, would have been accompanied by flashes of light?”

  “Probably,” Picard said, “but these were very weak compared to the ones in space.” He turned to Khozak. “It could be helpful, however, to issue an alert, asking everyone to be on the lookout and to report any unusual lights.”

  “Of course,” Khozak said, grimacing as he turned to Zalkan. “Zalkan, is that possible? Can we still get word out to everyone in the city?”

  “To everyone who still has a functioning terminal, yes. Assuming they use it for anything but continual fantasies.”

  “And assuming they can tell the difference between the fantasies and a message from the real world,” Denbahr added.

  Khozak nodded, turning back to Picard. “I believe you said there were a number of things we should know. What are the others, in addition to the energy surges within Jalkor?”

  Picard pulled in another breath and held it a moment. Data had acted correctly in temporarily withholding the information from the Krantinese, but that knowledge didn’t make it any easier for Picard now. “We have discovered something else in the mines, or, more accurately, below them.”

  “What?” Khozak’s most recent expression, one of careful neutrality, vanished, replaced by the belligerent wariness he had worn during most of his stay on the Enterprise. It was obvious he was not going to make Picard’s task any easier. “No one told me of any such discoveries when we were in the mines.”