Part 17 (1/2)

”Can you beam up two people?”

O'Brien paused. ”I could if they were wearing communicators to lock on to.”

Picard smiled. ”Send me four communicators down, if you would.”

”Aye, sir.”

Picard smiled at Kirsch, who was completely amazed by everything and clearly understood none of what was happening. He jumped when four golden badges suddenly s.h.i.+mmered into existence on the floor.

”Magic,” he whispered.

”Not quite.” Picard bent down and picked up the devices. He attached one to his tunic, then turned to Randolph.

”What are you doing?” he yelped.

”I'm going to have you and your friend there beamed aboard the Enterprise so I don't have to worry about you.” He clipped the communicator onto the struggling man.

”But it's going to be blown up any moment!”

”That seems only fair to me. You began the attack. Now you can sweat it out with my people.” He clipped the second communicator onto Hagan's robes. ”If there's anything that you can tell me to help me stop the attack, now would be a good time.”

”I told you I can't stop it!” Randolph was on the verge of tears. ”Picard, I beg of you-don't do this! It's murder!”

”No,” Picard replied. ”It's justice. If you wipe out my crew and s.h.i.+p, you'll die with it. You had better pray, then, that I can somehow stop the attack.” He triggered his own communicator. ”Do you read me, Mr. O'Brien?”

”Loud and almost clearly, Captain.”

”Beam up the other two communicators that I've activated, together with their wearers. And have a security team escort them to cells.”

”Aye, sir. Energizing!”

As his voice died away, columns of light surrounded the screaming, hysterical Randolph and the slightly more dignified Hagan. Kirsch's jaw fell open when the light s.h.i.+mmered and vanished, and the men were gone, also.

”Are they ... dead?” he asked, awe-stricken.

”No, Michael,” Picard replied gently. ”They're now on my s.h.i.+p. They've committed some serious crimes while they were here, and we are going to punish them for their actions. a.s.suming my s.h.i.+p survives the attack that Randolph triggered.”

At that moment the doors to the hall burst open, and several guards rushed in, weapons at the ready. They looked wildly around before das.h.i.+ng across to the three men. In seconds Picard was held by two soldiers, and a sword at his throat.

”Where is Randolph?” the leader of the men asked. ”He was in here.”

”Gone,” Picard replied. ”He will not be back.”

”d.a.m.nation.” The guard spat on the floor. ”He must have gotten wind of the duke's death somehow. That black magician of his, no doubt.” He thought for a moment. ”Well, if we don't have their heads to take to the captain, we have yours.” He nodded to his men. ”Kill them.”

Chapter Twenty-one.

THERE WAS no doubt at all about the alien nature of this room. Riker's neck was aching from all the craning he'd done as he'd stared around the place. It was ma.s.sive. It looked as if the Preservers had taken a gigantic natural cavern below the surface of this world and then turned it into a huge room by spraying glowing metal all over.

The floor was perfectly level, stretching several hundred feet in all directions from the entrance where they stood. The ceiling of the room was almost as high overhead. Stalact.i.tes hung down, each of them perfect, but of glittering metal instead of stone. The rocks in the walls and roof stood out clearly. The room had a warmth and light throughout it. Most caves Riker had ever ventured into were cool and damp, and more than a little fusty. The air here was perfectly balanced. Though there was no sound of machinery, he knew that there had to be an air purifier at work somewhere.

Around the walls and at regular intervals across the floor of the metal cavern were banks of machineries. He couldn't begin to guess at their purposes. Lights glittered and danced across them. The strange, spidery raised script of the Preservers adorned every piece of machinery. Riker-like all Starfleet academy students-had seen the examples from Miramanee a hundred times. It was the same style, and just as obscure here as it had been there. The only thing that Riker could recall about it was that it was somehow based on a system of musical tonalities.

It was weird, watching all of this activity taking place without a single being anywhere. What could it all be for? Was it somehow monitoring the world above them and recording information for the Preservers? Was it, even now, linked to similar machines on other worlds? Was it possible that the Preservers themselves could somewhere be watching them?

Deanna stepped into the room, her face a radiant mask. The sound of her footfalls echoed about the vast cathedral to science. ”This is where they once stood,” she breathed. ”They were here, and a portion of them resides here still.”

”You mean the machines that they left?” asked Riker gently. He followed her out onto the floor.

”No.” Deanna looked at him with hungry eyes. ”I can feel a part of them resting here. A fragment of their minds. It's not easy even for me, Will, but I can almost get through to them. It's hard to get their attention.” She shook her head. ”We're like insects to them. They see us, but they don't quite understand us.”

Riker shuddered. ”Is that what all this is?” he asked her, appalled. ”Is it like some giant ant farm to them? Is that what the people on the surface are to them?”

”No, not like that,” she replied. ”It's much more complex than that.” A tear trickled out of her eye. ”I can't quite grasp it. I can't ...” She s.h.i.+vered. ”Will, we're not supposed to be here. This world should be left alone. That's why it was placed here-to protect it from us.”

”They know about us?” snapped Riker.

”Not specifically. They only know that what they are doing is very delicate. It's like an artist at work, much more than a scientific experiment. I get the definite impression that what they are doing is more like painting a masterpiece than studying an experiment. But we're the wrong colors. We may be damaging to the picture.”

Ro frowned. ”Do they want us to leave? Or are we a mistake to be erased?”

Deanna shook her head. ”I can't tell. It's a kind of stray thought. Not focused. It's just there. The Preservers don't see us, exactly. They're like gardeners, who've discovered a mold growing on a prized plant. They don't see the individual cells, just the blight itself.”

”I don't like the sound of that,” Ro said to Riker. ”It suggests we're in for a dose of weed killer.”

”I don't like it, either.” Riker gripped Deanna by the shoulders. ”Deanna. Imzadi. Listen to me. Can you speak to them at all? Can you give them a message?”

Deanna struggled to focus on him. ”No. They can't hear me. My mind is too quiet, too small for them to hear. I can only understand them because there's just a tiny fraction of their substance here. If there were more, I'd be overwhelmed. I simply feel some of what is going through this small part of their minds.”

”Are they planning to do anything about us?” Riker demanded. ”Are we in danger here?”

”Danger?” Deanna sounded as if she were far away. ”Yes, I feel something about danger.” Then she suddenly snapped back to full awareness. ”Will-it's the Enterprise! There's some kind of attack under way against the s.h.i.+p!”

The deck under Geordi was shaking like a dog with fleas. Both Ops and navigation had red lights flickering all over them. Van Popering struggled to maintain his position. Jenny Mancini had somehow braced herself in her seat and was carrying out course corrections as needed to keep the Enterprise in motion.

”s.h.i.+elds down to forty percent,” Worf read out. His feet wide apart, he stood unmoving at his board. ”Forward s.h.i.+eld number four is failing.”

Geordi tried to ignore this bad news. ”Change to heading two one four mark seven,” he called. ”Keep us moving, Mancini.”

”Course laid in,” she responded through gritted teeth. ”And engaged.”

The deck shuddered again. Geordi could hear the strains the movement produced. He was itching to call engineering to discover how well the containment fields were holding up through all of this stress. But he knew that the last distraction they needed right now was him demanding a report.

Besides-the fields either held or collapsed. There was nothing he could do even if he had warning of the latter. He gripped the arms of the command chair and held on for dear life as the gravitational fluxes tore at the s.h.i.+p.

”Fields down to thirty-five percent,” Worf intoned. ”Forward s.h.i.+eld four is down. Three and five are straining to compensate. They will both burn out in fifteen seconds.”