While the crew numbly obeyed orders, Deanna’s gaze traveled to the viewscreen and its panorama of star clusters and distant nebulas. Somewhere out there was a vile enemy, dangerous beyond belief, which wasn’t above using biological warfare in its most horrible permutations.
“Tactical,” she ordered, “bring up everything we know about our last destination ... Lomar.”
“Admiral, good to see you!” Captain Picard said heartily, mustering more cheer than he felt. He strode up to Nechayev’s bed in the tasteful medical center aboard the Romulan warbird. La Forge was a step behind him, but the engineer couldn’t muster a smile. Dozens of worlds stood at the verge of destruction, and La Forge remained concerned about the two women caught up in the tragedy. Picard supposed that was the hallmark of a true crisis, when one’s priorities shifted in unforeseen directions.
“Captain Picard,” Nechayev said, squirming in her bed. “Why am I cooped up here? I feel perfectly fine!”
The captain sighed. “You nearly died on Myrmidon.”
“From what?” she demanded. “If I’m still here, that means the interphase generators worked as planned. Either that, or La Forge here is a ghost. Hello, Commander.”
“Hello, Admiral,” the engineer said with a respectful nod. “The interphase generators did work, and I’m not a ghost. Don’t you remember the attack just before the wave hit?”
“No, tell me about it.”
Nechayev scowled thoughtfully as La Forge and Picard related the story about the Neptune’s treachery. Coupled with the discovery of the fungus, at least they had a probable explanation for what had happened to the task force. It would also explain the sudden disappearance of the Enterprise.
“That’s not all,” said La Forge. “When the dust cleared, we weren’t alone on Myrmidon.” When he described his experience with the moss creature who impersonated Dolores Linton, the admiral cringed.
Picard went on, “Since Data is immune to the effects of the fungus—and the creatures who spawn it—we left him behind, to warn the survivors.”
“Why did you have to leave Myrmidon so suddenly?” asked Nechayev.
La Forge lowered his head modestly. “We have a theory on how to stop the Genesis Wave.”
After hearing the details, Admiral Nechayev tried to jump out of bed. “I’m alive, and we’ve got lots to do. Let me tell the captain we need a shuttlecraft.”
Picard steadied her arm, although he wished she would return to bed. From nowhere appeared a gray-haired Romulan doctor, who sneered at his patient. “You will lie quietly until I release you from that bed, or I’ll put you in the brig. Perhaps this is a good time to show you a mirror.”
From behind his back, the doctor produced an ornate looking glass, which he thrust into Nechayev’s hands. The startled woman took the mirror and slumped back onto the bed. She stared at her reflection, marveling that one side of her face was perfectly smooth, like a teenager’s cheek, while the other half showed the wrinkles, folds, and spots she had so richly earned.
“Somebody did a great ... half a job,” she muttered.
“That would be me,” Geordi answered sheepishly. “You were dying, and I used the mutagenic soil while it was still active ... applied it directly to your burns. I reasoned they would help you heal, and they did.”
“Am I infected with this fungus, too?” she asked.
“No,” answered the doctor. “As far as I can tell, you’re not. You seem to be very healthy ... for an elderly human.”
She blinked at the Romulan, but Picard could see her tense anger fading to a warm glow. “Thank you for helping me, Doctor. By all accounts, I should be dead twice over, but I’m not. So I’m not going to complain. However, if I’m healthy now, I presume I will be allowed to leave your care.”
“I suppose,” he said. “But you should be under observation, in case there are unexpected consequences of your unorthodox treatment.”
“Believe me, when I get back, I’ll be under observation,” said the admiral, looking again at her two-sided reflection in the mirror. “Let me get back and help save both of our worlds. I’ve faced the Genesis Wave head-on, and it’s a part of me now. I won’t have to explain its power—I’ll just point to my face. I’ll also prove that we can stand up to it and win.”
“Go on,” muttered the doctor. “I don’t think you will ever be a satisfactory patient.”
Nechayev leaped to her feet and wrapped the sheet around her slight form. “I need a new uniform. Where’s your replicator?”
The doctor scowled. “Do you think we can just replicate Starfleet admiral uniforms? That we have them in our data bank?”
“Please,” said Admiral Nechayev, her eyes narrowing. “Time is precious.”
The Romulan doctor grunted his disapproval and stood ramrod straight. “I will see what I can do.”
When he marched out of the room, Picard tapped his combadge. “Captain Picard to Commander Jagron.”
“Jagron here,” came the disdainful voice. “How is the admiral?”
“She’s well, and your doctor is going to release her. She’d like a shuttlecraft—to get back to the front and put La Forge’s plan into effect.”
“She’ll have to leave immediately,” answered the commander. “Because we have a new destination.”
“Where is that?” Picard frowned, dreading to hear that they had been ordered to Romulan space or some other hot spot.
“The Enterprise,” answered Jagron. “We’ve received her distress signal, and we’re the closest ones to her. They’re halfway to the origin point.”
La Forge lowered his head, a crestfallen look on his face. Both of them knew they weren’t going to return to Myrmidon any time soon. Picard wanted to tell him to trust Data, but Myrmidon was a bewitched and unpredictable place. He feared that the Enterprise was also compromised.
“We shall depart as soon as the admiral is off the ship. Jagron out.”
Picard turned to Admiral Nechayev, still huddled in her sheets, and asked, “Admiral, can you get some help to Myrmidon?”
“Yes, Captain, I will,” she promised.
* * *
“Fire!” barked Mot. Nobody did, and the barber shouted again, “Fire phasers! They’re not our people—they’re not people at all. Fire!”
Still his small cadre of soldiers nervously gripped their weapons and stared at the advancing horde of Bolians, shuffling toward the front door of the sanctuary. They looked like people they knew—relatives, lovers, children, old friends. It was extremely eerie, because reason told them that these people were not on Myrmidon. Or if they were, they were far away with no means to get here. Still the onslaught of friends and relatives, shambling out of the forest, was enough to paralyze anyone.
Mot shook off his malaise and grabbed a weapon from a startled youth. He raked the front line with phaser fire, and nothing whatsoever happened. “That’s on stun,” he said. “See, they’re not us. We can’t let them get too close.”
The big Bolian cranked up the setting and his courage, and his next volley of beams cut the advancing party into shreds. His cohorts were horrified, and there were angry shouts all around him; more than one phaser was pointed at Mot.
“Look at them!” he shouted. “Look at the dead ones!”
There weren’t any dead ones, they discovered to their shock, just leaves and sprigs caught in the underbrush. Some of the creatures in the back took on the identities of the ones who had disappeared, and they kept shuffling forward.
Mot stuck the phaser back into the boy’s hands and growled, “Fire!”
He did, and soon all of them were wantonly firing phasers. The primeval woods lit up with blazing streaks, felling trees and foes alike. Clumps of moss came tumbling out of the sky, and smoke swirled everywhere. It was like shooting up a row of hedges that kept advancing in unison. The hulking shapes no longer tried to disguise themselves—they just looked amorphous and menacing.
The intrepid band kept firing, but there was no relief
and no end. The faceless shamblers kept pouring out of the dense woods, their ranks never diminishing. They were crowding into the clearing. “Fall back!” Mot shouted, discouraged. “Into the sanctuary!”
With tears in his eyes, he hustled his frightened squad into the nebulous safety of the golden dome, and bolted the door behind him. Mot cried because of all that had been lost—an innocence as well as a civilization and a home. The might of Starfleet and the resources of the Federation had always protected them before, even from the Borg and the Dominion. But Starfleet crumbled in the face of this heinous weapon and the demons who sprang from the slime.
ten
“Welcome back,” said the smiling face of Beverly Crusher as Captain Picard stepped off the transporter platform onto the deck of the Enterprise. The captain beamed at his companion and gripped her by the shoulders. That was when he noticed the hypospray in her hand.
“Oh, this is an official greeting,” he said with disappointment.
Beverly grinned and lifted the hypospray. “This is my first official duty since getting well, and I requested it. Believe me, you’ll be glad you got this inoculation against the fungus.” The doctor administered the hypo with her usual efficiency.
Picard nodded with appreciation. “Good work on the vaccine.”
“I had nothing to do with it, except for being one of the guinea pigs,” she admitted. “It was all Dr. Haberlee. He’s still a little nervous but he held sickbay together. We don’t need the security detail anymore.”
“It sounds like we needed them on the bridge,” muttered Picard.
Another sparkling column appeared on the transporter platform, and Geordi La Forge stepped down. The engineer still looked gloomier than usual. “Sorry it took so long,” he said. “The Romulans are still cloaked and are only sending one at a time.”
“Taking precautions, are they?” Crusher asked, moving toward La Forge with a loaded hypospray. “They needn’t worry—we’ve got a vaccine now.”
“We won’t get sick?” asked Geordi with relief.
“You’ll be okay with the fungus, but you’re still susceptible to their telepathic abilities. It was Troi who finally got rid of the moss creature who infected our ship ... and the Neptune.”
Crusher looked pained and apologetic at the memory. “On the Neptune, it pretended to be Wesley. I thought he had come back to help us. Here, it pretended to be Commander Riker, and it nearly killed him.”
“How did Troi stop it?” asked the captain, moving toward the door.
Beverly frowned for a moment. “Uh, you’ll see as soon as you get to the bridge. We’re lucky that Troi got an allergic reaction to it, not the euphoria ... the willingness to believe that affected the rest of us.”
“Why is it some people get violently ill,” asked Picard, “while others can resist for days, or never become sick?”
“The creatures are cryptogamic parasites,” she answered. “They don’t want to kill you—not right away—they prefer to keep you alive to do their bidding. When they’re done with you, they can give you a fatal dose of the fungus that will kill you within hours. The toxics and chemicals in that fungus are quite an evil brew. We think the fungus might even be a symbiotic plant growing within the moss—it’s a complex creature.”
Picard nodded grimly as he stepped into the corridor. “Make sure you get the formula for the vaccine to Starfleet Medical. We have to send it to every ship and port in the Federation.”
“We have,” she answered wearily. “But immunizing everyone is a massive undertaking ... along with everything else that’s happening.”
Picard straightened his tunic, trying not to be overwhelmed by everything that needed to be done, at once. They were only one ship, and he was done playing defense—he wanted to go on the offensive. “How is Riker doing?”
“Still recovering. He should be out of sickbay in a day or so.” Crusher headed off in the opposite direction. “If you’ll excuse me, we’ve got to inoculate everyone on board.”
“Beverly,” said Picard with compassion, “I’m sorry that Wesley didn’t come back.”
“Me, too.” The doctor nodded sadly, then lifted her chin and charged off down the corridor.
Picard and La Forge took the turbolift to the bridge, and the captain found out what Beverly meant when she said he would know what had happened to the intruder. There was a giant, scorched hole in the deck where his command chair used to be.
“Hmmm,” said La Forge, “interesting decorating decision. Very bold.”
Counselor Troi lowered her head, looking chagrined. “I’m sorry, Captain. The repair crew is replicating what they need to fix it. I had to use the Jefferies tube to acess the bridge so I could confront that ... being.”
“Quick thinking, Commander,” said Picard with an appreciative nod. “I don’t think I’ll be doing much sitting, anyway. Where was the intruder taking the ship?’
“To a planet called Lomar,” Troi answered, bringing up a chart on the main viewscreen. “It’s old and mostly barren, but it bears a resemblance to the worlds created by the Genesis Wave. Captain, do you know ... what those creatures are like?”
“Yes, Myrmidon was infested with them. Terraforming is only a part of what they’re doing—they’re using the Genesis Wave to colonize and procreate.”
Troi grimaced. “We’ve got to stop them.”
“We will.” The captain’s stern expression softened a bit. “Now that I’m back, Commander, why don’t you take a break. Go check on my first officer.”
“Thank you, sir!” With a relieved smile on her face, Deanna hurried to the turbolift.
The captain strode behind the ops station. “Ensign, find out how close the Boneyard is to a planet named Lomar.”
“Yes, sir,” she answered, working her board furiously. “They’re close, about a light-year away from each other. The Boneyard is closer to our present position.”
Picard nodded, making a decision. “Tactical, alert Starfleet and the D’Arvuk that we’re headed to the Boneyard. Following that, we’ll be going to a planet named Lomar.”
From the tactical station, a young Deltan announced, “Captain, Starfleet has recalled all ships to Earth ... for the final evacuation.”
“There won’t be an evacuation,” vowed Picard. “We’ve got a plan to divert the wave. Contact Starfleet and tell them that we’re on a mission approved by Admiral Nechayev. She’ll back us up.”
“Yes, sir.” The young ensign worked his board for a few moments, then he reported, “Messages sent. The D’Arvuk is replying ... they request permission to accompany us.”
“Tell them we don’t expect to come back until the enemy has been defeated.” The captain’s lips thinned.
The young officers on the bridge exchanged nervous glances, then quickly turned back to their consoles. The Deltan sent Picard’s message, and a few seconds later, he reported, “That is acceptable to the Romulans.”
“Thank them for their courage, and send them the coordinates for the Boneyard.” Picard paced the deck, carefully avoiding the gaping hole. “Conn, set course for the Boneyard, maximum warp.”
* * *
Carol Marcus shook herself awake and stretched her arms luxuriously in the coolness of her bed, a lilac scent priming her senses. With her illness fading, she could smell again, and she noticed the fresh vase of flowers on her nightstand. For what seemed like the first time in days, her body wasn’t consumed by wracking coughs and pain, and her mind was clear. Everything seemed normal—except for the pink string tied around her finger, slightly pinching it. At first, Carol couldn’t remember why she had tied that string there, then it all came rushing back to her.
They’re not human, she told herself. David and Jim are dead. Those creatures out there are not my loved ones.
Carol primped her flat and dirty white hair, thinking that she felt strong enough to take a shower. They would be coming to see her again, now that she was almost recovered from the fever. Although the old woman des
pised her captors, she found herself looking forward to their contact once again. She then shuddered with self-disgust at that desire. If she hadn’t been so lonely, she wouldn’t have been such a prime candidate for their deception.
But she had to admit they did a good job impersonating David Marcus and Jim Kirk. Of course, they certainly had plenty of raw material to work with, all of it dredged from her own mind. She longed to see them again, even though she knew they were imposters. Quite excellent imposters.
If they can read my mind, she thought suddenly, won’t they know that I’m onto them?
I’ll have to act, too, she realized. My surface thoughts can’t betray me. I’ll have to play this game of pretend, too.
Some forty years ago, she’d had a yoga expert for a bodyguard, and she had trained extensively with him. She would have to use all of her powers of meditation and concentration to fool them, but she could do it. She would have to do it. Her life—and count less other lives—depended on it. It was important for her to present a facade of normality.
The old woman sat and practiced her yoga for a long time—how long, she didn’t know. Finally she was satisfied that she could face them without her thoughts giving her away. Now that she was mentally prepared, it was time to make herself physically presentable. She rose to her feet and walked toward the bathroom.
Although the door and windows to her bedroom were locked as tightly as a vault, she still had access to her bathroom. Like everything else, it was a replica of the one in her home on Pacifica. Now Carol could see that the sunshine beaming through the skylight overhead was artificial, not the hot island sun. This house had many conveniences, she thought ruefully, such as being close to Regula I, a space station that had blown up ninety years ago.
Where had they been when she was on vacation at her family home on Earth? Probably right here, came the answer. Wherever here is.
She turned on the shower and climbed inside. At least the warm water felt real, as did the smooth, tiled walls of the stall. She decided that her bedroom and bathroom had to be real buildings, albeit replicas. They had remained solid all through her illness, even after her captors had backed off.
STAR TREK: TNG - The Genesis Wave, Book Two Page 11
