by Mel Gilden
When the alien tried to stop him, Darm shoved him back and raised the phaser threateningly. “Any complaints?”
Forsh looked at the phaser and at the harsh expression on Darm’s face.
Another quake hit the station.
Forsh stumbled against the wall. “Take what you want,” he told Darm wearily. “Just go and leave me.”
Darm started to exit, then stopped. He looked down at Babe, who had been sitting nearby during all this. “He’s all yours, Forsh.”
Suddenly the fuzzy creature rose up on his hind legs. Except it wasn’t the creature that was rising. It was something else.
Babe was becoming Odo.
“You! The shapeshifting sheriff!” Darm roared.
The metamorphosis was complete, and Odo was once more his humanoid self. “Security Chief is the proper title.” Odo took a step forward. “You are under arrest.”
Darm focused the phaser on him. “You got no charges.”
“Selling something you don’t own is a start.”
Darm looked around. “There’s nothing here that I tried to sell.” Which was perfectly true, since Babe had been replaced by Odo.
“The real charge,” Odo explained, “is abduction of the Pyxian prince.”
“What prince? I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.”
“I’ve just checked the logs of the Ulysses. It did enter the star system of the Pyxians. You were on one of their moons.”
“So. I didn’t take no prince.”
“I believe you did,” Odo asserted.
“Then where is he?”
“That is what you are going to tell me.”
Darm raised the phaser. “I’m tellin’ you nothing, lawman.” The spacer fired at Odo at point-blank range.
The beam hit Odo full in the chest. Then the beam did a remarkable thing. It bounced off his chest and ricocheted back at Darm. The reflected beam struck the spacer and doubled him over as though he had been hammered by a fist.
Forsh watched all this with amazement.
Odo smiled. He tapped his bulked-up chest. “It’s what old Earth lawmen used to call a ‘bulletproof vest.’ Of course, this material is much more efficient. And elastic enough to stretch into any shape,” he added as his chest assumed its normal size.
The Security Chief knelt next to the unconscious spacer. “Fortunately, the reflected blast only stunned him. Unfortunately, that is enough to keep him sleeping for quite a while. Which means I can’t discover what he knows about the prince for some time.”
Odo returned the cards Darm had attempted to steal from Forsh. “I suggest in the future you find yourself a more reputable business associate.”
Another quake rumbled through the station.
Odo grabbed the unconscious Darm by the collar and dragged him toward the turbolifts. Around him the station seemed to be on the verge of disintegrating.
“Of course,” Odo remarked, “at the moment none of us seems to have a future to speak of.”
CHAPTER 10
Jake was also worried about his future. He had searched most of the upper sections of the pylon and found no trace of Babe. He feared that the alien, like other sick or injured creatures, might have crawled into some hole for security. In such cases the animal usually died because no one was there to help him. Jake did not want that to happen to Babe. He had to find him. And, by what might be termed a lucky accident, he did find him.
Adjacent to the construction module they had turned into a clubhouse was a sealed hutch where Cardassian workmen had locked their tools. Not only did the Cardassians steal everything from Bajor that could be crammed into the hold of a spaceship, they were also quite proficient at pillaging from each other.
The reason Jake had bypassed the hutch was that he believed it was sealed shut. But returning to the clubhouse, Jake stumbled on a loose cable and fell against the door of the hutch, causing it to swing open.
Babe was lying on the top shelf of the hutch, keeping to the shadows. In the faint light that filtered in when Jake propped the door open, he could see Babe’s golden fur. It seemed to have gotten lighter and appeared to be glowing.
Then, as he came closer, he realized that he was not seeing Babe’s fur, but golden strands of silk. Jake started to touch it, then stopped. If Babe was injured, this might be part of his healing process. He didn’t want to do something that would harm Babe.
Where were Nog and Dr. Bashir?
Then, as if in response to his urgent thoughts, Jake heard approaching footsteps.
“Jake?” Nog called out.
“I’m here,” Jake replied, stepping out of the locker. Nog ran up, followed by Dr. Bashir.
“You took long enough,” Jake commented to Nog.
“He didn’t want to come,” Nog replied, glancing at Bashir. “But I said it was the only way to get you to leave the pylon.”
“You have to get out of here,” Dr. Bashir told Jake. “The station is under attack, and these pylons may not last much longer.”
Suddenly another quake shook Deep Space Nine. This far from the center of the station, the impact was muffled, but they felt it all the same.
“What’s that?” Jake asked as he regained his balance.
“Spacequakes!” Nog said. “They’ve been happening all over the station.”
“That’s why we must go now,” Bashir implored.
Jake did not move. “Not without Babe.” He was determined not to leave his furry friend, no matter what. He pointed inside, and Dr. Bashir entered the storage locker.
“Extraordinary.”
Nog was also bewildered at what was happening to their pet. “Babe’s dying!”
The Ferengi started to run to Babe, but Bashir put out an arm and gently halted him. “Wait.”
Now Bashir began to act like a doctor. Holding his medical tricorder in front of him, he moved toward Babe, being careful not to alarm the creature. But there was little chance of that. Babe was occupied with other things, growing slender golden threads that were rapidly encircling his furry body.
“Do you know what’s happening to him?” Jake asked, hoping the doctor could fix whatever it was that was wrong.
Bashir did not immediately reply. He was too busy analyzing the readings on his tricorder.
“This is absolutely incredible,” he finally said aloud.
“What’s incredible?” Nog demanded.
“Babe is—” Bashir stopped. When it came to medicine, Jake knew that the doctor was determined to be accurate in his diagnosis. Sometimes his true brilliance was concealed by his halting manner of making a statement. “I think,” Bashir rephrased what he started to say, “that Babe is undergoing a transformation.”
“Is that good?” Nog asked.
“A transformation?” Jake did not understand what Bashir was talking about.
“Like—” Bashir thought for a moment. “You know how a caterpillar turns into a butterfly?”
Jake and Nog stared at him. They didn’t get it.
He tried again. “Babe is spinning a cocoon.”
“Babe is like a caterpillar?” Jake asked.
Bashir nodded. “Yes. Exactly. Babe has reached the end of one stage of his life and is about to enter a new one.”
“Like growing up?” Nog wondered.
“In a way, yes. People go from childhood to adulthood, and our bodies undergo significant changes. We call it puberty when a boy becomes a man, or a girl becomes a woman.”
“But what’s Babe going to become?”
“That is a very good question, Jake. But one for which I have no answer.”
All during their discussion the golden threads had continued to wrap around Babe. By now he was completely enveloped in the strange cocoon. There was no sign of the furry little creature that had been their pet.
“But we’ll see very soon,” Bashir added.
“Doesn’t it take a caterpillar a long time to become a butterfly?” Nog asked.
“Yes. But different species
change at different rates. My tricorder readings indicate that Babe’s metamorphosis is happening very fast.” Bashir kneeled and invited the boys to do likewise. “We are about to witness one of nature’s miracles.”
At the same time, in another part of the space station, Commander Sisko was witnessing something quite different—the apparent destruction of Deep Space Nine.
Operations looked like a disaster zone. Broken beams were everywhere. Several wall panels had broken loose, making it difficult to move around the room. Some of the workstations were overturned. Debris littered the floor and shifted position every time another of the rumbling quakes shook the station.
Reports of similar scenes of chaos came in from the rest of Deep Space Nine. These were only terrified verbal descriptions of havoc and devastation, since many of the monitors were not working. That was what Sisko hated the most. He was nearly blind as far as the damage to his station was concerned.
“I don’t understand it,” O’Brien kept saying whenever he confronted a new emergency. “According to the few readout panels that are still working, nothing is wrong.”
Kira scowled. “Look around, Chief. This is not nothing.”
Sisko had ordered the station’s phasers to return fire on the Pyxian ship. But the blasts may as well have been aimed at empty space for all the damage they did.
Dax was at a loss to explain it. “In three hundred years,” the Trill officer stated, “I’ve never seen anything like this. It’s not that the Pyxian shields are powerful. It’s that their ship doesn’t appear to be there at all.”
At that moment another sharp quake jolted the room. The walls seemed to scream in agony from the shock.
“I don’t know how much longer we’re going to hold together, Commander,” O’Brien said, struggling to regain his balance.
Surrounded by damaged equipment and a crew that was very close to the breaking point, Benjamin Sisko desperately needed a miracle.
A miracle was exactly what Jake and Nog were waiting for in the tool hutch in the upper docking pylon. It was what Dr. Julian Bashir had predicted. And as they watched, it began.
The cocoon that surrounded Babe was pulsating with a strange inner energy. The slender golden threads began to vibrate like the strings of a violin, making a sound unlike any they had ever heard. They covered their ears to blot out the siren wail that became so loud, it was painful. And still, the noise continued to reverberate inside their heads.
The noise was particularly painful to Nog, who could finally take it no longer and bolted from the locker.
Jake was about to follow him when he felt Bashir touch his arm. Jake responded and looked at where the doctor was pointing.
The cocoon was exploding. No—not exploding. Jake revised his first impression. It was evaporating.
The golden threads expanded and disappeared.
Suddenly, from inside the disintegrating cocoon, a bright light shone. Jake and Bashir shielded their eyes from the light that filled the hutch like the flash from an exploding star. The light lasted less than a microsecond, yet even when he opened his eyes again, the residual effects from the flash made afterimages continue to pop in front of Jake’s eyes like balloons. He thought he was blind and would never see again. But the balloons soon faded. Then, for a moment, everything was a blur. Finally his vision cleared. And what he saw was indeed a miracle.
CHAPTER 11
In Operations, Benjamin Sisko was not witnessing a miracle, but rather the violent end to a dream. This space station, constructed by Bajoran laborers for the conquering Cardassians, had become a bright beacon of hope for Bajor, a world that badly needed it. Now that dream was in danger of vanishing, along with Deep Space Nine.
And he could do nothing about it. The station was unable to either defend itself or take offensive action against this overpowering enemy.
“I just don’t understand what’s happening to us, Benjamin,” Dax said. “None of our weapons seem to have any effect.”
“It’s like playing a hologame,” O’Brien added. “Except this is for real.”
“For real—” Sisko started to say something, then stopped as another shock wave rolled through Operations.
Regaining his balance, Sisko looked over at the frightened figure of Darm, sitting where Odo had left him, held captive by pressure loops that encircled his ankles. The commander agreed with Odo that the Ulysses spacer appeared to be partly responsible for their plight. It had been confirmed that Darm had indeed landed an unauthorized runabout on one of the Pyxian moons.
But under questioning, Darm denied any knowledge of the Pyxian prince. He would perish along with everyone else on the station if he refused to tell the truth. Yet he remained stoic in his denial.
Meanwhile, reports of mass destruction continued to come in from all parts of the station. The fact that no one had been injured, except for some self-inflicted wounds when the crowds panicked, was remarkable. It was also very strange.
“This whole situation is very strange,” Sisko said aloud to no one in particular. “It’s almost as if—”
“Dad!”
Sisko turned and was startled to see his son standing in the open doorway of the turbolift.
“Jake,” Sisko said. “You don’t belong here.”
“It’s all right, Commander.” Julian Bashir emerged to join Jake. They were followed by Nog.
It was then that Sisko noticed someone else in the turbolift, someone the commander did not recognize.
Bashir looked over his shoulder at the stranger. “Sir, may I present His Highness, the Pyxian royal prince.”
Sisko saw a youth, about Jake’s age, tall and slender as a Zylian wind reed. He was humanoid in appearance, but covered from head to foot with purple pebbled skin.
“I am”—the boy paused, glanced over at Jake and Nog, then smiled as he turned again to face Sisko. “I am the one you called Babe.”
“I don’t understand,” O’Brien said.
“I think Dr. Bashir can explain,” Sisko said.
Bashir smiled the way he did whenever he had the opportunity to display his intelligence. “The being we knew as Babe was—like a caterpillar that has now changed into a butterfly.”
“That’s incredible.” O’Brien tried to grasp the concept.
Sisko rubbed his chin. “I can’t call you Babe anymore. What do I call you?”
“My true name is Joryl,” the boy that had been Babe replied. He looked over at the spacer Darm, who was shackled in the corner. “That one took me from my home before the Solitary—my time of changing—was complete.”
At that moment another quake shook the room.
Sisko stumbled, then quickly regained his balance. “I suggest we dispense with further explanations for the time being.” He looked at Joryl. “Can you help us stop this destruction before Deep Space Nine is totally demolished?”
Joryl nodded. He stepped to the communication terminal. “This is Joryl of the Line.”
“You are safe, my prince?” the reply echoed in the room.
“I am safe, Admiral. Let what has been done be undone.”
“By your command, it will be so.”
A blinding flash of light filled Operations. The intense glare lasted for an instant, and when it was gone everything in the station was exactly as it had been before the attack began.
“Ops was a shambles. Now it’s normal!” Kira observed the transformation with amazement.
Jake could see on the now-functioning display screens that everything on the space station—from the Promenade to the most remote docking bays—was also back to normal, as if nothing had ever happened.
“How is this possible?” O’Brien asked.
“Because,” Joryl said, “it never did happen. All that you saw—you saw in your minds. It was not real.” Joryl explained to Commander Sisko, “We Pyxians are a peaceful race.”
“Peaceful,” Kira grumbled. “You almost destroyed our station.”
“Not really, Major,” Sisko s
aid. “It was all an illusion.”
“That’s a trick I’d like to learn,” Nog said.
“Then we were never in any real danger?” Kira asked.
Joryl hesitated. “Not exactly. Although the Pyxians, using our mind-boosters, are only projecting an artificial reality—like in your own holosuites—the experience is still real to those involved in the illusion.”
“In other words, if your people had ‘destroyed’ Deep Space Nine, the trauma of that experience would have been devastating to everyone on board,” Bashir said.
Joryl nodded. “I am afraid that is correct.”
“Why,” Sisko wondered, “did your admiral not just beam aboard so we could discuss the matter—before it led to hostilities, even if the attack wasn’t real?”
“Ours is a very private race, Commander. Our only real defense is our ability to camouflage ourselves. Direct contact of any kind makes us vulnerable. We avoid it at all costs.” Joryl rose. “But I must leave now. My Solitary period is ended, and my people await their prince.”
Jake went over to this alien youth who now stood slightly taller than himself. “It’s kind of weird looking up at you instead of down.”
Joryl smiled at Jake. “Jake, I will not forget you. Or you, Nog.” He included Nog in his smile. “Nor the friendship that both of you offered to me.”
“We won’t forget you, either,” Jake replied. “You may not be our pet any longer, but you’ll always be our friend.”
Watching his father accompany Joryl to the Ops transporter, Jake felt as if something big and important was walking out of his life, and he felt lonely. He looked over and saw from Nog’s expression that his Ferengi friend obviously felt as bad about Joryl’s leaving Deep Space Nine as he did.
“Perhaps we will see you again, Joryl,” Sisko said as Joryl reached the transporter platform.
“Perhaps you will, Commander. This may be the moment for the Pyxians to begin reaching out to other life forms.”
“You’re welcome here any time,” Jake said as he felt in his pocket. After a moment of hesitation he took a well-worn baseball from it and tossed it to Joryl.
