Part 14 (1/2)

Troi blinked. ”How did you know?”

Picard flopped his hand on the desktop and casually said, ”One needn't be telepathic.”

She faltered, frowning into the black s.h.i.+ne of his desk, and said, ”Yes, I suppose it is obvious. But there's more, sir. Or shall I say, there are more. Many more. Millions more, in fact. Their level of communication is much higher than anything verbal, as though they've forgotten over the years how to use simple words and pictures. We may be the first outside contact they've had-”

”Since 1995,” she supplied steadily.

”Yes,” she murmured. ”For a while, what they wanted was very confusing. There were so many minds shouting at me, some rational, some not ... only the strongest of those can still maintain a single self-image, but only for limited amounts of time.”

”Like the appearance Riker witnessed in the corridor.”

”I believe so,” she told him, not ready to commit herself to that with a blind yes.

”And now it's clearer?” Picard prompted. ”What they want? You have some idea?”

Troi bent her elegant head, lashes like black whisk brooms dropping to shade her eyes. Then she looked up. ”Captain, I haven't told you everything.”

Jean-Luc Picard leaned forward, his elbows rubbing across the desk's smooth surface and reflected that she of all people was not one whom he counted on for courteous lies. Courteous silence, perhaps. But deception, no. The first reaction was anger, but that flared and died more quickly than a match in wind. Yet such confessions on a stars.h.i.+p could cost lives, and always provoked him.

But something had driven her to this, and Picard's curiosity was plenty bigger than his ego at this point.

”Then tell me everything now,” he said.

Troi raised her chin as though to walk into the word. ”About the confusion. It's true that there are millions of minds pressing upon me, but there is ... an absolute unanimity in what they want-”

The door buzzed.

”Yes, who is it?” Picard barked impatiently.

”Riker reporting, Captain.”

Picard started to admit him, but Troi grasped the rim of his desk and pulled forward in her chair. ”No, sir, please don't. Don't let him in.”

The curiosity burned. ”Not even Riker?” Picard said.

”Please, sir ... ”

He gazed at her for a moment, then spoke aloud to the intercom. ”Just a few more minutes, Mr. Riker.”

There was a thunderous pause. Picard could imagine the glances running the main bridge.

”Yes, sir ... I'll be out here.”

Picard indulged in a little grunt and muttered, ”Sounds a bit wounded, doesn't he? Now, what's this all about, Counselor? These people want us to do something for them?”

”You have a decision to make that no single person should have to make. I thought you shouldn't also have to live with the opinions of the entire crew. That's why I'm speaking to you privately.”

”I appreciate that, but please-”

”Most religions describe a kind of h.e.l.l, Captain,” she said carefully. Her shoulders shuddered with the effort. ”Now ... I know what that is.”

”No doubt, but what's that got to do with these beings?”

Troi's lovely eyes took on a bitter anger. ”I can't make it clear enough, sir, that these people are still alive. They're not supernatural. They're living creatures, many of whom are-or were-human as much as you are human. They have truly achieved immortality. They are still conscious and self-aware.”

”All right,” Picard told her, ”I understand that. What do they want?”

She clamped her hands into two tight b.a.l.l.s, the skin thinning over her knuckles and turning icy white. ”They want you to help them die.”

”Quit saying that. You're not a machine. I can tell that by just looking at you.”

Geordi LaForge gave Data a playful push as they entered the dark corridor that led to the warp reserve. It took clearance through three doors, each marked AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY before they were admitted to the especially heavy door marked RESTRICTED AREA.

ANTIMATTER RESERVE CONTAINMENT CENTER.

NO ENTRY WITHOUT LEVEL 5 CLEARANCE.

The room was very dark, lit only by two tiny pink utility lights on either side. Data's flashlight cut a clean white path before them. Though the darkness still pressed around them, Geordi could see quite well by that small brightness, and he led the way through stacked storage crates and high-clearance mechanical and computer panels.

”I expected a lot of problems to come my way on s.p.a.ce duty,” Geordi said, ”but I didn't expect one of them to be trying to find a definition for life itself.”

”That is indeed the captain's dilemma now,” Data said, ”because of me.”

”It's not because of you. Cut it out. Boy, after all this trying to act human, you sure found an annoying way to actually do it.”

Data looked up into the darkness, quickly, hopefully. ”What am I doing?”

”Pitying yourself, that's what. Knock it off.”

Since he hadn't been aware of doing it, Data wasn't quite sure what to knock off. By the time he found knock it off in his memory banks, the subject had pa.s.sed and Geordi was leading the way into an anteroom that held most of the computer monitors for the actual antimatter containment. On the dim panels, a few lights and patterns were flicking and flas.h.i.+ng away happily in their mechanical ignorance, as if trying to say that all was well, all was as it should be.

”It's got to be here somewhere,” Geordi muttered. ”You try the antimatter injector and I'll-”

As the doors came together behind them, there was a corresponding clatter on the starboard side of the room that made them both look, just in time to see a dark form duck behind a panel.

”Who's there?” Geordi demanded.

Data stepped in front of him and sharply ordered, ”This is Commander Data. You are in a restricted area. Identify yourself.”

An innocent face peeked up in the corner, suddenly looking very guilty.

”Wesley!” Geordi exclaimed. ”What are you doing in here? Come out of there.”

Wesley's lanky form, still trying to grow into its own long bones, slowly sprouted from behind the panel. His hands gripped the hem of his sweater, a dark and thickly knit sweater that under these circ.u.mstances looked like reconnaissance gear. He'd known he was going to be in a cool area of the s.h.i.+p, evidently. ”What're you two doing here?” he echoed. ”I mean, it's sort of the middle of a crisis, isn't it?”

”Right in the middle,” Geordi said. ”The captain's ordered an energy blackout-”

”I know.”

”And we picked up a power drain in the reserve tank. We've got to find it before the creature picks it up.” Through his visor Geordi saw Wesley's face suddenly erupt with infrared.