She held up her hand and motioned to a door emblazoned with golden symbols. It slid open, and she conducted him into a small, tasteful clubhouse with overstuffed chairs, a bar, and gaming tables. The walls were decorated with lifelike holographic renderings of Romulan ships attacking the enemy, including Starfleet. The room was suspiciously empty at this hour, although there was an attendant behind the bar.
Kaylena motioned to the servant. “What would you like to drink?”
“Synthehol,” he answered.
She smiled gayly. “The only thing you’re allowed to drink at official negotiations? Will you at least try it the way I like it—with a sprig of Talosian Sipping Plant?”
“Very well,” answered Picard.
The drinks were served in tall glasses, befitting the lovely flowered stalk, and they sat in comfortable chairs at what appeared to be a card table. Commander Kaylena lifted her glass to him. “On behalf of my crew, thank you for your quick work in saving members of our boarding party. Although we detected the radiation, we never realized what dangers existed there. The Petrask has flown closer to the Barcelona to begin more extensive scanner readings.”
Picard frowned and banged his glass on the table. “Once again, you’ve taken action without consulting us.”
[72] “As far as I can see, it’s a derelict ship in neutral space,” answered the commander with a haughty shrug. “You’re not on board, you haven’t taken any steps to salvage it. What action were you going to take next?”
He studied her carefully and decided to be truthful. “We were going to send probes over.”
“Then we’re of one mind,” answered Kaylena with a brief smile and a soothing tone. “We withdraw the request to search your ship, although you will turn over the prototype radiation suits made from our technology.”
“And the Genesis technology?” asked the captain, stirring his drink with the graceful, pink-petaled stalk. At once, the Talosian Sipping Plant produced a beautiful whistle which varied in pitch the faster he stirred it. His drink also grew cloudy with a pink pulp, and he grew oddly light-headed.
“I believe this plant is illegal in the Federation,” remarked Picard.
“Ah, but you’re not in the Federation now,” she answered slyly. “It’s the only thing which makes synthehol palatable.”
He took a sip, and the heady aroma was almost enough to knock him out of his chair. Picard placed the exotic drink back on the table and regarded his adversary. “We were talking about Genesis technology you may have found on Lomar?”
“ ‘May have found’ is the operative phrase,” answered the Romulan. She tool a prolonged drink of her beverage. “You discovered the moss homeworld first, but you left it for us. And now you want to discuss technology which you always claimed didn’t exist ... until two weeks ago.” She laughed heartily. “Even if we had it, you have no legal basis to demand we return such technology.”
Picard touched the long sprig of Talosian Sipping Plant. “If we give you the radiation suits, you’ll leave?”
“No,” she answered with a troubled frown. “Now that we’ve lost personnel on that derelict, we have to investigate for our report. [73] Unless you can tell us what caused those deaths—and I know you can’t—we must pursue this.”
“We’re in the same position,” said Picard. “We should cooperate and share information. If you’ll show me what you’re doing, I’ll try not to duplicate it with our probes.”
“To do that, we have to leave this lounge,” said Kaylena wistfully, as she admired their richly appointed surroundings. “I haven’t been to the officer’s retreat in months—I’ve forgotten how restful it is. I thought it might be the right place to inspire conversation, and it has.”
Picard looked around the empty room. “It appears that your officers could use more rest.”
“Couldn’t we all?” With a sigh, the elegant Romulan rose to her feet and resumed her military bearing. “Very well, I’ll take you to our observation lounge and show you some of our scanner results. We may not even need your probes.”
“Fine,” answered Picard, taking a last look at the beautiful flower in the tall glass of pink liquid.
“This is far enough!” declared Yorka, breathing heavily and sweating in the thin air of the moon. Despite his bulk and his exhaustion, he set the metal box very carefully in the slate-gray dirt. The other two Bajorans and the young pilot stopped and sunk wearily to their knees. Wheezing, gasping, and limping, Chellac brought up the rear.
“If you thought someone was following us,” rasped the Ferengi, “rest assured, we’ve lost them.”
“I didn’t think anyone was following us,” said Yorka.
“Then why did we drag ourselves way out here?” demanded the Ferengi. Wheezing, he sunk to the dusty ground.
Prylar Yorka looked around at the lifeless mountains and sooty dirt of the enormous moon. The only thing noteworthy was the bronze-colored planet, Meldrar I, that dominated the night sky. Despite that gleaming beacon, this side of the moon was dismal, which [74] was all to his liking, because it was far removed from prying eyes. He was a bit concerned about the two nonbelievers in his party, but the monk knew he couldn’t do everything alone. He needed people like the Ferengi and the pilot if he were going to make a huge impact. People would have to be taken into his confidence, but he would have to be selective.
Before worrying about the next step, it was time to see what had brought them all this distance. Yorka knelt down in front of the metallic box and reached for the delicate recessed handle on the polished door. His hands were trembling.
“Easy there,” said Chellac. “What are you going to do?”
“I’m just going to open it and take a look,” replied the Bajoran, as if this were an everyday occurrence. But for the first time, he got a new fear—what if there was nothing in the box? What if it was all a cruel hoax ... or something important to the Romulans that he couldn’t use?
But no, every cell in his body told him that he was a tool of something grand—something much bigger than himself or his small entourage. “I’m going to open it,” he declared.
Chellac and the pilot, Cassie Jackson, drew closer, as did one of the acolytes. The other acolyte had wandered up a craggy stone to take a look at something in the distance. Deciding not to wait for him, Yorka gripped the handle, and opened the box with a quick but sure motion.
Nothing happened, except that a gorgeous red and black display glimmered in a language and symbols which Yorka had never seen before, and he was well read. Around this brilliant screen were large jewel-like buttons, well-spaced as if for a child. The primary colors of the buttons attracted him—red, green, blue, plus yellow—and he again thought that a child was supposed to use this device. Was it a toy?
Once again, the prylar had a pang of doubt, and he wanted to press all the buttons at once and see if he had been fooled.
“You don’t have a user’s manual, do you?” asked the Ferengi with a nervous laugh.
[75] “Yellow,” whispered Yorka. “It’s the color of the wormhole.”
Before they could stop him or say anything, he pressed the yellow button. The other buttons began to blink in an alternating pattern, the red screen displayed large but unknown script, and the box began to make a low, ominous hum. At a guess, it was powering up ... for some purpose which was no doubt glorious. Yorka placed his hands on the wondrous object, wanting to communicate with it, wanting to know its secrets and powers.
Without even thinking, his thumb hit the green button, and the object began to vibrate under his hands. “Praise be to the Prophets!” he shouted with joy. A sudden but furious wind picked up on the barren plain, whipping the dust into the thickening atmosphere. Dark clouds began to gather, obscuring the bronze planet; the prylar could feel intense prickling all along his skin.
“Turn it off!” shouted Chellac, looking over his shoulder. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”
“Oh, I think I do!” cried the prylar in tri
umph. In quick succession, he hit the red and blue buttons, and the very ground beneath their feet began to rumble. With a whirring sound, the back of the box opened, revealing a lens, and a glowing beam shot out. A shock wave knocked Yorka back on his haunches, but the excited monk scrambled to his knees in time to watch the beam fan across the gray dust. Wherever it played, the land burst into flames—with brilliant green waves that scorched everything in an expanding triangle from their position.
“Oh, my gosh!” exclaimed Cassie.
Yorka heard a scream and realized that the youngest acolyte was somewhere out there, in the midst of the searing green flames. The other acolyte started forward, but the prylar grabbed him and pulled him back before he could step into the beam—for he was certain it would mean death.
“Leave him,” he told the lad. “You can’t save him—he’s gone!”
Sniffing back tears, the acolyte nodded, and soon their attention was riveted on the extraordinary metamorphosis taking place in front [76] of them. As the green flames began to recede, shapes began to rise from the desolate moonscape; these dark forms twisted and writhed as if alive, and Yorka realized they were enormous plants, growing at an accelerated pace. A whole new ecosystem was being created out there in the wilderness—in thousand of square kilometers of nothing.
“I hope the shuttlecraft isn’t out there, too,” muttered Chellac worriedly.
“It isn’t.” The Bajoran pointed down at their tracks, which led away from the churning horizon. Wind and sleet swirled around them, dense growth rose from the dust, while the astounding relic blazed new life on this desolate moon. He heard the others mutter and gasp, and well they should—for this was a gift from the Prophets.
The beam suddenly stopped, and the small lens on the back of the box closed again. The red display returned to what looked like a waiting state, as if this miracle could be produced again at his will. It would have to be at his will, thought Yorka, if he hoped to swiftly rejoin the Vedek Assembly and then be declared kai—the first true kai since Opaka.
Prylar Yorka grinned with delight and threw his hands into the air. “I have found it ... the Orb of Life!”
The observation lounge of the Javlek was equivalent to the stellar cartography room on the Enterprise; it featured a brilliant three-dimensional display with multilevel platforms, where observers and astronomers could insert themselves into the action. Right now, the panoramic display had begun to shimmer and break apart, as if affected by interference. A moment later, the mammoth warbird shook as if it had been struck by a quantum torpedo. Captain Picard staggered to stay on his feet, as did Commander Kaylena.
A momentary panic ensued among the astronomers, but their commander calmed them down with a few curt orders. “Everyone, [77] stay at your posts! Try to track the disturbance ... get the source. The rest of you, check on the other ships!”
She squeezed her stiff collar, activating communications. “Commander Kaylena to the bridge—are we under attack? Are shields up?”
There was no answer, except for an ominous crackle, and Picard tapped his comm badge. “Picard to Enterprise.” He waited for an answer, and none came. “Picard to bridge,” he repeated with the same result.
“Commander!” called a nervous technician from his console. “The Petrask is no longer registering on scanners. Neither is the Starfleet ship.”
“Which ship?” demanded Picard.
The Romulan checked his readouts. “The derelict ... the Barcelona. They were right next to each other.”
“Can you get anything on viewscreen?” asked the commander.
“No,” answered the scientist. He looked at his colleagues in the observation lounge, and none of them were able to offer any enlightenment.
One finally said, “Commander, I’m monitoring our main systems from the bridge. There are shipwide failures ... shields are down ... and we’re on emergency power reserve. Impulse power is out.”
“The shuttlebay is not far from here,” said Commander Kaylena, looking pointedly at Picard. “We could take a look for ourselves.”
He nodded, and the commander dashed toward the door, shouting orders. “Stay at your posts! Take scanner readings, and try to reestablish communications!” As Kaylena flew down the corridor, Picard had to run to keep up with her.
The Ferengi gazed in awe at the incredible tangle of misshapen vines and sprawling trees; still moving, they covered the ground like maggots on a ripe piece of meat. A noxious mist was forming over [78] this grotesque growth, making Chellac gag. He took a drag on his oxygen mask and said, “You know, I’m not really sure that’s an Orb. I have a better guess as to what it is.”
With a scowl, the big Bajoran stepped toward the Ferengi, towering over him. “I say it’s an Orb.”
“Okay, Orb of Life it is,” agreed the Ferengi. “Catchy name, has a presold recognition, and it delivers ... life!” He looked nervously at the popping, sprouting jungle in front of them, wondering how they could ever explain it without getting into heaps of trouble. Every instinct warned him to run away from this madness, but he was indebted to the prylar. Besides, this was a fascinating opportunity if ever there was one.
“How do you want to promote it?” asked Chellac.
“I want everyone to know, especially the Vedek Assembly,” said the prylar with a triumphant smile. Then his jowled face grew somber. “But we have to be secretive ... to keep it away from others. And protect it.”
“That’s for certain,” answered the Ferengi, tugging thoughtfully on a dangling earlobe. “What we need is to show this to people with influence, important figures whom everyone will listen to and trust.”
“Wait a minute,” said the pilot, Cassie, holding up her hand and stepping into the conversation. “First of all, you need me more than anyone, because that mess is going to draw attention, even out here.” She pointed at the grotesque mutation which was turning a chunk of the moon into an alien landscape.
“We can’t even think about going back to the spaceport ... or the prison.” She looked into a dull green sky full of swirling gray clouds which hadn’t been there a few seconds ago. “In fact, the guards will be here soon. So what am I bid for one shuttlecraft ride out of here?”
Yorka jumped to his feet, puffing out his barrel chest. “You’ll get nothing! We paid you a fair price for your services, plus a generous tip. You’re just being an opportunist—”
[79] “Ignore him,” said Chellac, putting his arm around the young woman and taking her aside. “You’re absolutely right—at the moment, you are the most important member of our team. So we’ll give you all we’ve got, as soon as we can. If you want me to empty my pockets and my purse right now, I will.”
“Aren’t you even going to bargain with her?” asked the acolyte, still rubbing away tears.
“No,” answered Chellac. “You don’t bargain with somebody who has all the supply when you only have demand. You throw yourself on their mercy, which is what I’m doing. But we should get moving now and negotiate later.”
“We’re within transporter range of my shuttlecraft,” said Cassie matter-of-factly. “But we can only beam one at a time.”
“Why didn’t you tell us that before?” demanded the Ferengi.
“Well, you all seemed to want to walk so badly, so I let you walk,” she answered with a shrug. “Besides, I needed the exercise.”
She flipped over a lapel on her uniform to reveal a combadge. “Jackson to Shuttle 1347, acknowledge.”
“Acknowledge transmission,” answered the computer’s efficient voice. “What is your order?”
“Can you lock onto my transporter signal?”
“Yes.”
“Stand by, Computer.” She motioned to Chellac, Yorka, and the acolyte. “All of you, gather together!”
They had to tear themselves away from the bizarre spectacle in order to obey her order, and Yorka grabbed the Orb of Life, clutching it protectively to his chest. “Does your shuttlecraft have warp drive?”
; “Yes, it’s the latest model,” answered the pilot. “Computer, transport me first, then lock onto the other three humanoid life-forms in this vicinity. Energize when ready.”
Chellac was very relieved when the young pilot disappeared in a shimmering pillar of swirling particles, and he patiently waited his turn. Much to his chagrin, Yorka went next, followed by the acolyte. [80] While the Ferengi fidgeted nervously, he glanced over his shoulder at the hellish growth consuming this chunk of the moon. If there were any real profit to be had in this discovery, he reasoned, it would probably be in preventing the device from being used.
Finally Chellac felt the familiar tingle of the transporter beam, and he relaxed as the unreal scene in front of him gradually faded away.
With Commander Kaylena at the controls and Captain Picard in the copilot’s seat, a small green shuttlecraft soared away from the space doors of the Javlek. They banked around the starboard nacelle of the warbird and set course for the most recent positions of the Barcelona and the Petrask. It hardly mattered that the scanners weren’t effective, because a vast field of debris floated in space where the two ships had been. The extensive collection of scrap metal was silhouetted against a huge black curtain that blocked out half the stars in their viewport.
“What is that?” asked Kaylena in amazement. “That black field behind the ships. Did it destroy them?”
“I don’t know, but I wouldn’t get too close,” warned Picard. He peered at the staggering wreckage and the equally strange darkness. “I think I see something moving in the debris. It might be survivors—”
“I see it,” answered Kaylena, working her controls. “But I’ll have to get closer to get a visual contact. Don’t worry, Captain, our shields are at full strength.”
Dropping to a speed that was little faster than their momentum, the small shuttlecraft slowly edged into the field of debris. Small clumps of dust spattered and sparkled against their shields, but still the Romulan commander piloted the craft deeper into the sea of destruction. The Petrask must have had a crew of several hundred, thought Picard, yet the stoic commander said nothing about the massive loss of life. Picard could see the concern etched into her face, but he could also see the clench-jawed determination to confront this mystery and solve it.
STAR TREK: TNG - The Genesis Wave, Book Three Page 8
