“No, no,” Q exclaimed, not content with the ongoing panorama of life and the universe. “I’ve seen all this before! I want to see something else. I want to be somewhere else.”
“WHERE DO YOU WISH TO JOURNEY?” The Guardian flashed its willingness to convey Q wherever he desired.
The black-garbed youth stamped his foot impatiently, sending yet another fissure through the massive block beneath him. “If I knew that, I wouldn’t be here in the first place, you pretentious doorframe.” He hopped off the stone, raising a cloud of gray powder where he landed, and approached the Guardian. “Show me more,” he commanded. “Show me what’s new, what’s different!”
“Here we go,” his older self sighed. He rose to his feet and took Picard by the elbow, leading him over to just behind where young Q now stood. “Get ready,” he warned Picard, his words unheard by the youth only a few centimeters away, who quivered with unfocused energy.
Again? Picard thought, readying himself for another change of venue. He’d been on whirlwind tours of the Klingon Empire that had moved at a more leisurely pace.
Within the Guardian, images zipped past so speedily that he could barely keep up with them. He caught only quick, almost subliminal fragments of random events, of which only the smallest fraction could he even begin to identify: a mighty sailing ship sinking beneath the waves, a glistening Changeling dissolving into a golden pool, a dozen Borg cubes converging on a defenseless world, a shuttlecraft crashing into a shimmering wall of light…
“What now?” Picard asked, unable to look away from the rapid-fire parade of images. “What does he intend to do?”
“Stick a pin in a map,” his companion stated. “Entrust his future to the fickle whims of chance.” He shrugged apologetically. “It seemed like the only thing to do at the time.”
The young Q glanced back over his shoulder, and, for a second, Picard thought they had been exposed. But the youth was merely giving the lifeless ruins one last look before taking a deep breath, closing his eyes, crossing his fingers, and hurling himself forward into the mist-draped opening of the time portal. Picard had only an instant to register the young Q’s disappearance before the other Q’s hands shoved him roughly from behind, propelling him straight into the waiting maw of the Guardian of Forever.
Seventeen
According to standard Starfleet guidelines, it took zero-point-three-five seconds to go from impulse flight to warp travel. According to Riker’s chronometer on the bridge, Geordi and his engineering crew did it in zero-point-two.
It wasn’t nearly fast enough.
Riker felt a momentary surge of acceleration that trailed off almost immediately as the Calamarain hit them from behind like the front of a hurricane. The ship’s inertial dampers were tested to the limit as its propulsive warp field collapsed instantaneously, causing the vessel to skid to a halt through friction with the cloud’s billowing mass. The storm enveloped them at once, much to the delight of little q, who clapped his tiny hands in synch with the thunder.
Riker was considerably less amused. Dammit, he thought. It’s not fair! He was no Betazoid, but he could practically feel the distress and disappointment permeating the bridge. Baeta Leyoro swore and slammed a fist into her open palm. Lieutenant Barclay poked at the engineering controls rather frantically, as if hoping to reverse their readings. Only Data appeared unaffected by the dashing of their hopes of escape, looking preoccupied with his repairs to the operations console. “Let me guess,” Riker said bitterly. “No more warp drive.”
Barclay swallowed nervously before confirming the awful truth. “I’m afraid not, Commander. Something’s interfering with the field coils again.”
“If this is typical of your expeditions,” the female Q sniffed, “it’s a wonder that you humans ever got out of your own backwoods solar system.”
If we’d known the likes of you were waiting for us, Riker mused, we might have had second thoughts. Outwardly, he disregarded the Q’s needling, preferring to address the problem of the Calamarain, who at least refrained from waspish gibes. He was starting to wonder, though, whether this was truly a new entity at all, or if the original Q had simply had a sex change. Granted, he had already seen both Q and his alleged mate at the same time, but somehow he suspected that materializing in two places simultaneously was not beyond Q’s powers.
“Shall I go to impulse, sir?” Ensign Clarze asked.
Riker gave the matter a moment’s thought. Was there any way they could outrace the Calamarain? Given that they had previously encountered the cloud-creatures in an entirely different sector several years ago, he could only deduce that the Calamarain were capable of faster-than-light travel on their own, assuming that these were indeed the very same entities that had attacked Q aboard the Enterprise during the third year of their ongoing mission. Certainly, the storm had managed to keep pace with them at impulse speed.
“No, Mr. Clarze,” Riker declared evenly. They were running low on options, but he was determined to maintain a confident air for the sake of the crew’s morale. “Well, Mr. Data?” Riker asked, addressing the android. “It’s looking like you’re our best hope at the moment.”
If all else failed, he thought, he would have to order a saucer-separation maneuver, dividing the Enterprise into two independent vessels. The Calamarain appeared to clump together as one cohesive mass; possibly they could not pursue two ships at the same time. In theory, he could distract the sentient cloud with the battle section while the majority of the crew escaped in the saucer module. Naturally, he would remain aboard the battle bridge until the bitter end—and hope that Captain Picard eventually returned to command the saucer.
Apparently tired of standing upon the bridge, the female Q and her little boy had, without even thinking of asking anyone’s permission, occupied Riker’s own accustomed seat, to the right of the captain’s chair. The child sat on his mother’s lap, sucking his thumb and watching the main viewer as if it were the latest educational holotape from the Federated Children’s Workshop. Riker didn’t waste any breath objecting to the woman’s brazen disregard of bridge etiquette and protocol. Why bother arguing decent manners with a Q? I wonder how long they’ll choose to stick around if I have to separate the saucer, he wondered. Would they transfer to the battle bridge as well, and stay all the way to the ship’s final annihilation?
Before he sacrificed one half of the Enterprise, however, along with the lives of the bridge and engineering crew, Riker intended to exhaust every other alternative, which was where Data came in.
And the Universal Translator.
“I believe I have,” Data stated, “successfully developed a set of algorithms that may translate the Calamarain’s tachyon emissions into verbal communication and vice versa, although the initial results may be crude and rudimentary at best.”
“We don’t want to recite poetry to them,” Riker said, “just call a truce.” He stared grimly at the luminescent fog stretching across the main viewer. Jagged bolts of electricity and incessant peals of thunder rocked the ship. “Say hello, Mr. Data.”
The android’s fingers manipulated the controls at Ops faster than Riker’s eye could follow them. “I am diverting power to the primary deflector dish,” he explained, “in order to produce a narrow wavelength tachyon stream similar to those the Calamarain appear to use to communicate. If my calculations are correct, our tachyon beam should translate as a simple greeting.”
“I hope you’re right, Data,” Riker said. “It would be a shame if we accidentally insulted them by mistake.”
“Indeed,” Data replied, cocking his head as if the possibility had not previously occurred to him, “although it is difficult to imagine how we could conceivably make them more hostile than they already appear to be.”
You’ve got a point there, Riker admitted, given that the Calamarain had spent the last several hours dead set on shaking the Enterprise apart. The sharp decline in the strength of the ship’s deflector shields testified to the force and severity o
f the Calamarain’s assault. Perhaps now we can finally learn why they attacked us in the first place.
“Greeting transmitted,” Data reported. The tachyon emission was invisible to the naked eye, yet Riker peered at the viewer regardless, looking for some sign that the Calamarain had received their message. All he saw, though, were the same churning mists and flashes of discharged energy that had besieged the Enterprise since before the captain disappeared.
Troi abruptly sat up straight in her chair. “They heard us,” she confirmed, her empathic senses once more linked to the Calamarain. “I feel surprise…and confusion. They’re not sure what to do.”
“Good work, Mr. Data,” Riker said, hope surging inside him for the first time in nearly an hour, “and you too, Deanna.” Was he just deluding himself or had the oppressive thunder actually subsided a degree or two in the last few moments? They weren’t out of the woods yet, but maybe the Calamarain had stopped hammering them long enough to contemplate Data’s greeting. Go ahead, he thought to his amorphous foes. Think it over some. Give us another chance to make contact!
“Commander,” Data alerted him, “short-range sensors detect an incoming transmission from the Calamarain, using the same narrow wavelength they applied earlier.”
Hope flared in Riker. Thanks to Data, they still had a prayer of turning this thing around. Too bad Captain Picard isn’t here to speak with the Calamarain. He’s probably the best diplomat in Starfleet. “Put them through, Mr. Data.”
“Yes, Commander,” Data said. “Our modified translator is interpreting the transmission now.”
A genderless, inhuman voice emerged from the bridge’s concealed loudspeakers. The voice lacked any recognizable inflections and sounded as though it were coming from someplace deep underwater. “We/singular am/are the Calamarain,” it stated.
“I apologize for the atonal quality of the translation,” Data commented, “as well as any irregularities in syntax or grammar. Insufficient time was available to provide for nuance or aesthetics.”
“This will be fine,” Riker assured him. “Can the computer translate what I say into terms the Calamarain can understand?”
“Affirmative, Commander,” Data said. “You may speak normally.”
Riker nodded, then took a deep breath before speaking. “This is Commander William T. Riker of the Starship Enterprise, representing the United Federation of Planets.” He resisted an urge to straighten his uniform; the Calamarain were not likely to appreciate any adjustment in his attire, even if they could see him, which was unlikely. Their senses were surely very different from his own. “Do I have the honor of addressing the leader of the Calamarain?”
There was a lag of no more than a second while Data’s program translated his words into a series of tachyon beams; then that chilling voice spoke again. “We/singular speak from/for the Calamarain,” it said in its muffled, watery tones.
What precisely did it mean by that? Was more than one individual addressing him at once, Riker wondered, or was it merely a verbal conceit, like the royal “we” once employed by Earth’s ancient monarchs? Or could it be that the Calamarain genuinely possessed a collective consciousness like the Borg? He repressed a shudder. Anything that reminded him of the Borg was not good news. Riker decided to take the speaker at its word, whoever it or they might be.
“We come in peace,” he declared, going straight to the heart of the matter. “Why have you attacked us?”
After another brief pause, the eerie voice returned. “Mote abates/attenuates. No assistance/release permitted. Stop/eliminate.”
What? Riker gave Data a quizzical look, but the android could do nothing but shrug. “I am sorry, Commander, but that is the closest translation,” he said.
“Deanna?” Riker whispered, hoping she could decipher the Calamarain’s cryptic explanation.
“I sense no deception,” she said. “They are quite sincere, very much so. Whatever they’re trying to tell us, it’s very important to them.” She bowed her head and massaged her brow with both hands, clearly striving to achieve an even greater communion with the enigmatic aliens. “Beneath their words, I’m picking up that same mixture of fear and anger.”
Why would the Calamarain be afraid of us? Riker couldn’t figure it out. If the events of the last hour or so had proved anything, it was that the Enterprise could not inflict any lasting harm on the Calamarain. If only I knew what they meant, he thought. “I don’t understand,” he said, raising his voice. “What do you want of us?”
“Preserve/defend mote,” the Calamarain insisted obscurely.
Interlude
What is that? the spider asked. That is what?
Something was there, on the other side, that he could not quite identify, something at the center of it all. The smoke surrounded the bug, and the bug surrounded It, but what was It, glowing within the entrapped insect like a candle in a skull? Sparking like a quark in the dark?
There was something Q-ish about it, but different, too. Not the Q, nor a Q, but flavored much the same. It is new, the spider realized with a shock. Newer than new. Q-er than Q.
New… For the first time it occurred to the spider to wonder how much might have changed, there on the other side. But that would depend on how long he’d been outside, wouldn’t it, and that would be…? No! Not! No! His mind scuttled away from the question, unable to face the answer that loomed just past his awareness.
Change, change, he chanted, calming himself. Change on the range into something quite strange. Change could be good, especially his own. He could make changes, too, and he would, yes indeed, just as soon as he could.
Everything changes, and will change even more….
Eighteen
Someone was singing in the snow.
Picard had little time to orient himself. An instant ago he had inhabited the arid ruins encircling the Guardian of Forever. Now he seemed to be located amid a frozen wasteland, his boots sinking into the icy crust, cold and distant stars shining in the dark sky far above him. The rime-covered plain stretched about him in all directions. Like Cocytus, he thought, the ninth and lowest level of hell. His breath misted before him, but he did not feel in any danger of freezing to death. Q’s work, no doubt. The cold, dry air felt chill against Picard’s body, nothing more. Very well then, he thought, disinclined to question his lack of hypothermia. He had more important mysteries to solve, like where was that infernal singing coming from?
The voice, rich and resonant, carried through the glacial cold:
“She was a kind-hearted girl, a lissome fair daughter,
Who always declined the gifts that I brought her….”
Still unaware of his two humanoid observers, the young Q looked similarly intrigued by the robust voice crooning through the frigid air. Deterred not at all by the forbidding landscape, he trudged across the frosty tundra in search of the source of the melody. Picard and the older Q followed closely behind him, sometimes stepping in his sunken footprints. Starlight trickled down through the endless night, but not enough to truly light their way. Defying logic and conventional means of combustion, Q whipped up a torch, which he held out in front of him. Lambent red flames flickered above his fist, casting an eerie crimson glow upon their frozen path. The sleeves of Q’s charcoal robe flapped slowly in the biting winter wind, and Picard found himself wishing that Starfleet uniforms came complete with gloves and a scarf. Although no new snow fell from the cloudless sky, the breeze tossed loosely packed white flakes into the air, making vision difficult. The icy bits pelted his face, melting against his reddened cheeks and brow.
“But pity’s the thing, so I begged for cool water,
And then led her away like a lamb to a slaughter….”
They marched for several minutes, during which time Picard observed the utter absence of any signs of animation. Nothing moved upon or above the ice except the windblown particles of snow. Picard wondered if any form of life existed beneath the permafrost, such as that found in Antarctica. Perhaps, if h
e could place this planet by means of the constellations overhead, it might be worth bringing the Enterprise by to check? Then he recalled that all of this was taking place millions of years in the past. Any life-forms that might exist here and now would most likely be long extinct when he returned to his own time. For all I know, this entire planet and star system may not even exist in the twenty-fourth century.
The soles of his boots crunched through the snow. No, he knew instinctively, there was no life here. This was a dead place, devoid of vitality, empty of possibility. Save for the singing voice, and the soft hiss of the burning torch, the icy plain was locked in silence. Much like the old Klingon penal colony on Rura Penthe, he mused, known to history as the “aliens’ graveyard.” Surely, that icebound planetoid could have been no more bleak and inhospitable than this.
“Like a lamb to slaughter, yes, like a lamb to the slaughter….”
The echoing refrain grew louder as they neared its origin. Soon Picard spied the figure of a man, human in appearance, sitting upon a granite boulder covered by a thick veneer of frost. He appeared larger than either Q, and his stout frame was draped in heavy clothing that looked as though it had seen better days yet nonetheless retained a semblance of faded glory. His heavy fur coat was frayed around its sleeves and along its hem while his high black boots were scuffed and the heels worn down to the sole. Rags were wrapped around his hands and boots to hold on to his heat, and a ratty velvet scarf protected his throat. A wide-brimmed hat, drooping over his brow, and tattered trousers completed his outfit, giving him an archaic and faintly dispossessed air.