“Why do favors for humans?” asked Horek with a disdainful sniff. “They’ve been nothing but a curse to us, and this is just more of the same.”
“Ah, but the galaxy would be a duller place without them,” replied Tomalak. “To be truthful, I don’t know if I’m going back to Myrmidon at all, because I haven’t gotten an answer on my request. My science officers will have to be satisfied with the long-range scans before I endanger this ship.”
“After that, will you rendezvous with the Enterprise?” asked Jagron.
“I suppose so. They’ll be at the forefront of whatever action is next. I wonder why I haven’t received an answer from High Command.” Impatiently Commander Tomalak moved toward the burnished conference table and ran his hand over a cornpanel. “Commander to bridge.”
“Yes, my liege,” a voice answered crisply. “Centurion Londerval at your command.”
“Centurion, have we received any dispatches from High Command?”
“Yes, sir, a considerable number of them,” came the answer. “Subspace traffic is very high, and the encryption we must use in Federation space is slowing down our processing time.”
“I don’t want excuses!” barked Tomalak. “Did we receive an answer about returning to Myrmidon?”
“Yes, Commander, but I didn’t feel the orders were urgent, since they don’t involve us.”
Tomalak scowled. “What do you mean, the orders don’t involve us?”
“High Command has ordered the D’Arvuk to Myrmidon to rescue Admiral Nechayev, and retrieve the interphase generators. We are to await orders.”
The gray-haired commander gave a sidelong glance at his young peer, and Jagron shrugged his shoulders, feigning surprise. “They probably want to send the most expendable crew of the four of us.”
“I’m sure it wasn’t an accident,” replied Tomalak pointedly. His dark eyes drilled into the eyes of the taller officer, who blithely looked away. Jagron knew this assignment was the doing of the Proconsul of the Senate, to give him a chance to steal the Genesis technology, if an opportunity presented itself.
“You’d better return to your ship and receive your orders,” said Horak.
Jagron carefully set his fluted glass on the table and turned to his host. “May I ask for the criteria your science officers have been using? I’d like to know when it’s safe to proceed.”
“Of course,” Tomalak answered cheerfully. “I’ll forward all of our data to your ship. Give my regards to Captain Picard, will you? Tell him to watch his back.”
“If he hasn’t learned that already, he’s not worthy of his reputation,” Commander Jagron replied as he strode toward the door.
* * *
Feeling frustrated, Captain Picard stepped from the turbolift onto the bridge of the Enterprise. He had spent almost an hour in sickbay, where no one would tell him anything about Dr. Crusher and her ill-fated crew. Finally Dr. Haberlee, a resident on the ship for less than six months, had suggested that he leave, saying they would contact him when they had results from their tests. Beverly and the others were out of immediate danger, although their long-term prognosis was still in doubt.
Commander Riker rose from the captain’s chair and bounded forward to meet him. “Captain, we looked at the logs of the Myrmidon operation, as you ordered, and we found something unusual.”
The first officer led the way toward Data’s station, where the android was hard at work, his fingers flying over the membrane keypads. “The Neptune didn’t go down empty-handed,” said Riker.
“What do you mean?” asked Picard.
Data looked up from his readouts. “I cannot account for how this happened, which is troubling. Although all eight members of the temporary crew are accounted for, the log clearly shows that one humanoid life-form perished with the ship when it struck the wave.”
“Why didn’t the transporter room locate this person?” Picard asked, frowning at the implications.
“He was shielded by the warp core containment field,” answered Data. “The log only picked him up when the warp core failed.”
“Hiding?” asked the captain. “Are we talking about a stowaway?”
“That would be the logical assumption,” answered the android, “except that Commander Riker, Dr. Crusher, and I searched the Neptune and found no one on board.”
“Could he have kept hidden from us?” asked Riker.
The android frowned slightly. “I personally searched the engine room, which is the only place on a ship of that size where he could have remained hidden. The facts would indicate that I was negligent in my duty.”
“I doubt that,” replied the captain. “Could somebody have beamed aboard the Neptune when the crew went over? Or even later?”
“That theory would also fit the facts, except there is no record of any other transporter activity during that time. And none of our crew members are missing.” Data cocked his head thoughtfully. “We have had many passengers on board recently, and one of them could have stowed away on the Enterprise, waiting for this opportunity.”
“That must be it,” said Riker.
Data shook his head doubtfully. “To hide successfully on both ships and to conceal transporter use—that would require detailed knowledge of Starfleet procedures and spacecraft. We would be talking about a very sophisticated provocateur.”
Captain Picard scowled, not liking any of these explanations, or the questions they raised. “Something happened over on that ship—in the space of a few hours—and we’re going to find out what it is. We owe it to Dr. Crusher and the others. I put them into a dangerous situation, and I feel responsible.”
Riker cleared his throat and said, “The admiral ordered you to staff that ship.”
“Yes, but knowing its history, we should have been more careful.”
“A lot was going on at the time—you can’t blame yourself.” The first officer’s defensive posture softened to one of sympathy. “How are they doing?”
“They’re comatose, breathing artificially, surrounded by an armed security detail. It seems absurd to keep them under guard, but we’re sticking to procedures until I get an explanation.” The captain paced toward the command chair and circled thoughtfully behind it.
“We haven’t gotten any new orders,” said Riker. “Do you want to maintain this position and keep waiting for the Romulans?”
“Yes, I want to assist them when they go to rescue Admiral Nechayev and Commander La Forge.”
“If they are still alive,” Data added bluntly.
“Yes,” admitted Picard quietly. “At any rate, we need to have a firsthand report from Myrmidon.”
His combadge beeped, and a deep voice said importantly, “Sickbay to Captain Picard.”
“Picard here.”
“This is Dr. Haberlee. You’ll be happy to know that we found the cause of the illness that’s affecting Dr. Crusher and the others. It may explain their actions, too.”
Picard glanced at Riker, who gave him a confident nod, as if to say that all would become clear in time. “I’m listening,” said the captain.
The young doctor cleared his throat and went on, “We’re almost certain that their illness is caused by some kind of fast-growing fungus that’s infected their lungs and brains. We have similar fungi on Earth, like the aspergillus niger, which can live inside an old tomb or a cave for thousands of years. Histoplasmosis, valley fever—two more deadly diseases which come from fungi. This fungus is probably airborne, too, and it works fast once it hits the lungs.”
Picard nodded thoughtfully. “I’ve read about aspergillus niger. It was thought to be the cause of King Tut’s Curse, which claimed about twenty people when Tutankhamen’s tomb was first opened.”
“Exactly,” Haberlee answered, sounding pleased that the captain understood. “It causes high fever and hallucinations. Maybe that’s what killed the original crew of the Neptune.”
“What happened to their bodies?” asked Riker.
“We’re still looking into that, Commande
r,” replied the doctor. “But now that we know what it is, we can proceed with treatment. I expect a full recovery.”
“Thank you, Doctor, that’s excellent news,” said Picard. “I still want to talk to them as soon as possible. Now that you know what it is, maybe you can answer this question: Could those eight officers have been fit enough to fly that ship and mount an attack on the planet, just seconds before we beamed them aboard?”
After a long pause, Haberlee replied hesitantly, “I’m not sure. From what we saw, I’d have to say no, because they couldn’t even stand up. But I believe they might have been weakened by the transporter beam, which threw their systems into shock. Mind you, they weren’t doing well before, but they might have still been on their feet. A fungal infection can go very suddenly from the symptoms of a mild cold to a raging fever and hallucinations. It would have shut down their lungs, hearts, and brains if we hadn’t caught it.”
Picard nodded solemnly, trying to piece it all together. There were still gaps in their understanding, but at least two of the questions had been answered. “Are you sure that there’s no danger to the crew?”
“Absolutely,” answered Haberlee. “We’ve been keeping on alert both here and in the transporter room, scanning all the time. And we haven’t found any airborne particles. The biofilter probably got any off their clothes and skin, but the fungus was too metastasized in their bodies.”
Picard glanced at his strapping first officer, who looked as healthy as ever. “Commander Riker went over to that ship on the initial away team, and he didn’t come down with this disease.”
“There are reasons for that. Dr. Crusher and her crew got a much longer exposure than the first team, and they spent time in every part of the ship. Maybe Commander Riker didn’t go where the fungus was active, or he was only there a few seconds. It’s like all those people who died after entering King Tut’s tomb—the first ones in got a stronger dose. Plus people’s bodies react differently to a thing like this. It might lie dormant in one person for years, and another person could have immunity, thanks to their genetics. Just to be on the safe side, you should send the commander down here for a checkup.”
At that, the smile faded from Will’s clean-shaven face, and he frowned at the captain. “I’m on my way.” Squaring his shoulders, the first officer marched toward the turbolift.
“Thank you, Dr. Haberlee,” Picard said. “I appreciate your quick work on this.”
“My pleasure, Captain. But I should ask—we aren’t going to be getting a lot of injured refugees, are we? If sickbay gets flooded again, it will be difficult to give them the proper care.”
“I think we can avoid that, but I can’t promise anything. The fleet is falling back to the next inhabited planet in the path of the wave, but we’re staying near Myrmidon. We might have to pick up casualties there.”
“Commander Riker is here,” the young doctor reported. “I’ll keep you informed.”
“Thank you. Picard out.” The captain turned to Data on the ops console. “Have you had a chance to run long-range scans on Myrmidon?”
“I have, but I have not had time to analyze the data. The computer refused to identify Myrmidon as a recognized planet, so no comparisons were possible. It classified all plant and animal life as ‘unknown,’ and declared the atmosphere to be highly unstable. It is essentially a class-L planet with class-M characteristics along the equatorial belt. The computer predicted there would be a moderate likelihood of intelligent life on the planet.”
“That’s what it seems to me,” muttered Picard grimly, “a moderate likelihood.”
For several seconds, Captain Picard stood in the center of his bridge, gazing at the tranquil darkness of space on the main viewscreen. Only it wasn’t tranquil at all. In that soothing darkness lurked a monster, devouring everything in its path and leaving behind strange hybrid planets. What was the method behind all of this madness? Despite those who had always wanted to turn it into a weapon, Genesis had never been about destruction. It was always about growth and regeneration.
Perhaps Carol Marcus and her team had been arrogant to think that their vision of a useful planet was the only vision. Even a lifeless rock or dust cloud deserved its unique existence without being destroyed in the name of progress. No matter how one looked at it, the Genesis Effect was about playing God, which was always a dangerous and selfish endeavor.
Who is playing God with us? he wondered.
When the comlink chimed, it stirred the captain from his reverie. “Riker to bridge,” barked a voice, and Picard instantly recognized the urgency in Riker’s tone.
“What is it, Number One?”
“One of Crusher’s crew, Ensign Paruk’N, is missing.”
“How is that possible?” asked the captain with concern.
“That’s a good question, considering that the other seven are still unconscious. When I got here, Dr. Haberlee took me for a tour and showed me his patients. We got to the last bed, and it was empty, with blankets rolled up to look like a person.”
“But the security detail—”
“Didn’t see a thing. It is hectic down here, and we’re hoping the video log will indicate something. Dr. Haberlee is mortified, but he needs to concentrate on his patients. I’ll stay here awhile and try to sort it out.”
“Good.” The captain took a deep breath, fighting the temptation to rush to sickbay himself. What could he do that Riker, Haberlee, and half a dozen security officers couldn’t? Faced with the Genesis Wave, they hardly needed this.
“Keep me informed,” said the captain, although every time he learned something, he seemed to know less. “We’ll try to find him from here. Picard out.”
Studying his console, Data shook his head. “Ensign Paruk’N is not on board the Enterprise.”
“Go to yellow alert,” said the captain grimly.
three
Leah Brahms twisted and squirmed on the rock-hard slab upon which she was expected to sleep. The crew berths on the HoS were like big shelves carved into the bulkhead, and it was hard to believe that even Klingons could sleep on one. Nevertheless, three of her shipmates snored loudly in nearby berths.
As Brahms had learned, on a Klingon vessel the size of the HoS, even the captain didn’t get a separate stateroom. She slept in the austere crew quarters along with the rest of them. This presented some privacy problems, as did the lack of other amenities on the HoS, but Leah was determined to fit in and earn her crew’s respect. However, she had claimed an unused laboratory near the transporter room as her private lair; right now she was thinking about making a mattress from rags and hiding it down there.
As she lay on the hard berth, unable to sleep, Leah checked her chronometer. With a start, she realized that it was two hours past the time the Genesis Wave was due to hit Myrmidon. How had they fared? she wondered. Had the phase-shifting protected people on a large scale as effectively as it had protected her alone? If so, there were now millions of people who had the unique displeasure of having lived through the Genesis Wave. Leah took some grim satisfaction from knowing that she and Deanna Troi weren’t the only ones anymore.
Will any of them be driven to revenge the way I am? she wondered Or am I the only one, besides Maltz, who wants an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth?
There was no answer in the dreary bowels of the Klingon attack cruiser, only the chorus of snoring Klingons. Leah realized that she couldn’t sleep, at least not here and not now. She rose to her feet and quickly pulled on her blue jumpsuit. She felt odd dressing differently from her crew, but she couldn’t really see herself in all that stiff, garish body armor. She wasn’t really a captain, except in Maltz’s view, and it hardly felt as if they were part of any fleet at all. Leah felt as if she was a renegade, with allegiance to no one; her only possessions were her pain and anger.
Trying not to wake anyone, she stepped lightly from the sleeping quarters and found herself in the narrow corridor.
She chuckled at herself, her voice echoing gen
tly in the corridor. To think that she could find and destroy the ones perpetrating the Genesis Wave, when a task force had failed, was ridiculous. But she shared a common belief with Maltz: This damnable evil had come straight after both of them, trying to crush them as it had crushed everything in their lives. But they had escaped. The enemy’s plan was almost perfect, but not quite.
Nature hated perfection, so it had let them live to fight again, Leah decided. At the root, this was a battle between nature and a coldhearted, artificial substitute for nature. Where nature moved slowly to cut down on risks, Genesis rolled with abandon, destroying the good along with the bad. That the technology had originated with her species was mortifying, but also typical ... of humans. But they would never have used Genesis in this fashion, even if they knew how. Who would?
As Brahms walked that lonely corridor, she decided that she had to make a profile of the kind of species who would have such desperate needs—and so little regard for life—that they would unleash the Genesis Wave.
Without really knowing where she was headed, Leah rounded a corner and plowed into a hulking Klingon coming from the other direction. She bounced off a barrel chest covered in thick sashes and chain mail, and he grabbed her arm brusquely to keep her on her feet.
“Captain,” grumbled the Klingon, not hiding his mirth at her embarrassment. As he let go of her arm, Leah remembered that he was the weapons master, named Gradok. Judging by the number of scars on his rugged face and his noticeable limp, she wondered how good a weapons master he could be, but she didn’t say that.
“Master Gradok,” she replied, “just ending your shift?”
“No, I was checking the aft phaser arrays,” he said, taking a step toward her. “And where might you be headed?”
“I’m familiarizing myself with the ship,” answered Brahms, taking a step back. “I should be sleeping, but I ... just wasn’t tired.”
The big Klingon smiled, showing gaps in his collection of teeth. “Our berths are not what you’re used to in Starfleet, are they? You like a soft bed with a firm ... mattress. But I could show you that a hard bunk is better. For many reasons.”
STAR TREK: TNG - The Genesis Wave, Book Two Page 3
