Star Trek: TNG Indstinguishable From Magic (25 page)

“Let me guess, that’s the Shadow Treasurers’ side of the deal.”

“They wanted something in return for the hiring of the vessels and mercenaries. A small price to pay.”

“And the thought of trying to take Captain Picard out of history never occurred.”

Bok halted. “Ah, now there’s a precious idea, beyond the dreams of avarice. Make sure there is no Jean-Luc Picard. With no Jean-Luc Picard, there is no Battle of Maxia. With no Battle of Maxia, my son remains alive.”

“With no Jean-Luc Picard there’s no defense against the Borg incursions of the past—”

“With no Jean-Luc Picard, there’s no provoking the Q into introducing an Alpha Quadrant vessel to the Borg,” Bok countered instantly. “That means no Borg invasion. As you can see, removing Picard’s existence would be doing the Federation some much-needed favors also.”

“Is that all that matters to you, Bok? Revenge?”

“No, hew-mon, not revenge. Family.”

“Family.”

“Nothing is more important than blood. Not profit, not latinum, not the Nagus, and not your Federation.” La Forge felt a bizarre mix of sympathy and astonishment. He had never heard a Ferengi put anything ahead of profit, other than Bok’s own drive for revenge. “Have you never lost a member of your family, hew-mon?”

La Forge momentarily imagined he could see his mother’s face one more time, and that there was a hint of her perfume in the air. “Everybody has.”

“True, but I mean, shall we say, before their time. Suddenly and far away, leaving you no chance to prepare for the adjustments that must be made to your life . . . and no chance to say goodbye,” Bok finished quietly.

“Yes,” La Forge admitted cautiously. “I do understand. There’s an old saying, from one of the largest regions on Earth, that the greatest curse the gods can bestow is for a parent to outlive their children.”

“Then there is some wisdom on Earth, and misfortune, to have learned such a lesson so well. Do your people have anything to say about revenge?”

“There’s one about first digging two graves before setting out on revenge.” La Forge hesitated. “You know that getting revenge won’t bring your son back.”

“A lot of people have told me that, over the years, and it took a long time for me to realize that they were right. Revenge will not bring my son back.” He clenched his fists, but then shook his head and unclenched them with a wave. “I realized that I was looking at the matter the wrong way. I should have been looking at how to bring my son back.”

“That’s impossible.”

“Nothing is impossible.”

“And the ends justify any means?” La Forge shivered. “How much damage would you inflict to get the ends you want?”

“Ends, beginnings . . . I will do whatever it takes.” Bok peered at Geordi, his smile widening. “You’re afraid, La Forge? Terrified, for the future, for the very existence of your precious Federation?” Bok laughed. “Understandable. A man with a grudge and a time machine would be something it would be wise to be afraid of.”

“Is this your way of gloating, Bok?”

“Gloating . . .” Bok shrugged. “Perhaps. It would feel better to be saying such things to Picard, but his lackey will have to do. If it’s reassurances you want, let me reassure you that I’m not planning to do anything that would jeopardize the existence of my son.”

“Apart from creating whole new timelines.”

“No!” La Forge was surprised by the sudden flash of rage in Bok’s eyes. The Ferengi grabbed him by the throat, his nails digging painfully into La Forge’s neck. “No new
timelines! I will not tolerate a timeline in which my son does not live, and I will not bear having his life be shuffled aside into some alternate timeline!” La Forge stared into the snarling face of a madman. Bok released him after a moment, pushing him away. “You may be reassured,” the Ferengi continued stiffly, “that I am bearing in mind the law of conservation of reality.”

“Conservation of reality?” It was rare that La Forge heard of a scientific law that was new to him, but this was definitely one. “You mentioned that before.”

“Twenty-sixth-century science, La Forge. Beyond your comprehension.”

“If it’s not beyond yours, it’s not beyond mine.”

Bok sighed, and almost seemed to shrink, though he lost none of his grim intensity. “I am not going to erase Picard from history, though it was amusing to let you think so.” Geordi felt momentarily dizzy, though he wasn’t sure whether it was from Bok’s apparent change of heart, or being half-throttled. “I am going,” Bok continued, “to ensure that my son does not attend the Battle of Maxia.” He gave a dismissive wave. “Let Picard kill some other Ferengi, while my son stays safe on Ferenginar to earn his own profits.
That
is the change I will make to the timeline. The protection of my son’s life, arranged two hundred years in advance.”

T
he only place on the ship where the guards didn’t have their eyes on the Starfleet officers was in the washroom that had been set up in what was originally
Intrepid
’s decontamination
suite. Blue lighting gave the shower stalls a bizarre and headache-inducing tone that made the place feel cold and impersonal.

It was the perfect place to meet to plan. Reg and Balis were already waiting, Balis’s blue skin was a terrifyingly corpse-like gray by the light, when La Forge walked in and explained what Bok had told him.

“To be honest,” La Forge admitted, “Bok’s so obsessed with what happened to his son that I’m surprised he’s never tried something like this before.” He fixed Reg and Balis with a look of grim determination. “We have to regain control of
Intrepid
. Or . . .” He gritted his teeth, wishing he didn’t have to say the words. “Or destroy it.”

“At least we’re not alone.”

“We’re not? We look pretty alone to me, Reg.”

“On this ship, yes, but
Challenger
will be following, you said so yourself. Scotty is—”

“A miracle worker, I know. And if anyone can follow a cloaked ship, he can. But even if they follow us to the Split Infinite, we’re still going to have to prevent Bok from taking the ship in, and I doubt we have much time. We’ve been here long enough already.”

“Their guards are watching us all the time,” Balis said. “How are we going to get the chance to do anything?”

“We’ll have to make our own chances,” Geordi said.

On the bridge, a Ferengi hurried over to Bok, crouching obsequiously. “Daimon, we’ve located Kren’s ship. It is dead.”

“Kren has finally managed to get his ship destroyed?” The man was always too eager for his own good.

“No. We’re still receiving telemetry from their warp core. The ship still exists, at least.”

“Either way,
Challenger
will begin pursuing us.”

“If they have any idea where we were heading.”

“They have enough engineering brainpower aboard to have a good chance of tracking us.”

“We should have destroyed them,” Sloe pointed out.

Bok grimaced. “That would have been nice, yes, but a
Galaxy
-class vessel is infuriatingly powerful. Delaying them gives us a much better margin of success.”

“I hope you’re sure of that.”

“Experience makes me sure,” Bok reminded him. He moved over to the communications console, and opened a channel to the
K’t’inga
-class ship that was in his employ. “Harga, this is Bok.”

“Harga here, Daimon.”

“
Challenger
has neutralized Kren’s vessel. Backtrack and make sure that the Federation ship is not following. If it is, do what you can to hold it in check.”

“Consider them checked.”

Rasmussen was waiting outside the decontamination section when La Forge, Barclay, and Balis emerged, just in time to see Sloe run to greet him. “It’s time for the test.”

Rasmussen clapped his hands together. “I’m on my way.” He turned. “Geordi, Reg, you might want to come along and watch the test.”

“Test?”

“The scientific method, Geordi. You don’t seriously think I’m going to risk flying into the Infinite without first making sure that the trip can be done?”

“You mean Bok didn’t already test it from his ship?”

“He would have attracted too much attention.”

Rasmussen and Sloe led them to the armory, which was now just a gray box, since Commander Hunt had
transported most of its contents back to
Challenger
. The crates that Bok’s men had brought with them were stacked in one corner, cut off from everyone by a portable forcefield generator. La Forge would dearly have loved to know what was in them, and what they had to do with Bok and/or Rasmussen’s plans, but the guards raised their weapons toward him as soon as he took a step in the direction of the crates.

Bok glared at him from the depths of his hollow eyes, and waggled a finger warningly. “Next time, La Forge, the guards will just shoot.”

Stepping aside, Geordi wondered what anything in here could have to do with traveling through the Infinite.

As Bok supervised, two Ferengi maneuvered a torpedo-like probe on a cradle into the room. Unlike a photon torpedo casing, its matte surface was curved and bulging with sensor nodes and lenses. They slid it into the center of the armory, and stopped before Bok. “The probe is ready,” one of them said, somewhat unnecessarily.

“Good. Ras-mew-son?”

Rasmussen handed Sloe a guidance chip. “The course is pre-programmed already. All we have to do is point and shoot.” He made a pistol gesture with his fingers, then blew across the tip of his index finger. Sloe nodded, and slotted the guidance chip into an access panel on the probe’s surface.

Bok drew his phaser and adjusted it to a low setting, then used the beam to scrawl his name across a blank piece of the probe’s surface in Ferengi script. “That should be sufficient as a test.”

“And automatically a collectible,” Rasmussen pointed out.

Bok glared at him for a second, then grinned nastily. “Profit before we even begin. Surely an omen.”

Sloe closed up the access panel and nodded to the two Ferengi handlers, who moved the probe toward the torpedo bay.

By the time everyone returned to the bridge, the probe was reported in position, and ready to fire. Sloe took the tactical position, with Bok and Rasmussen flanking him. La Forge and Barclay waited by the conference table. Bok and Rasmussen were hopping with excitement as Sloe acquainted himself with the tactical controls. “Whenever you’re ready, Sloe,” Bok prompted.

“Well, if I’m reading these controls right—”

“Then you’ll get to live,” Bok intoned through gritted teeth. “Get on with it.”

“Target the Infinite,” Rasmussen said, “but along the vector we already calculated from this position. If we’re even a fraction off, we’ll never know if it works.”

Sloe nodded, manipulating the controls, pausing before he hit the fire button.
Intrepid
trembled slightly, and everyone on the bridge instinctively looked to the screen. A blazing pinpoint of light streaked away from the ship, and arced gracefully toward the eye-bending multidimensional flower of plasma that bloomed ahead.

“Probe running true,” Sloe reported. “Entering the Infinite in sixteen seconds.”

Rasmussen remained where he was, his gut twisting into tense knots, desperate to know already what would happen. Bok stepped around and sat in the center seat without removing his eyes from the screen.

“Eight seconds,” Sloe said. “This is jolly exciting—”

“Terrifying, you mean,” Rasmussen grumbled.

“Three seconds . . . two . . . one . . . contact with the Infinite.” Sloe’s voice was tight with suppressed excitement.
He looked up. “Contact with the probe lost, on course at loss of contact.”

“Now comes the interesting part,” Rasmussen said. “And by interesting I really mean boring and laborious.” He took the science station, and beckoned Barclay over. “You can help me out here. If our calculations are right, we need to scan an area from ten to fifteen thousand kilometers off the port beam, but we don’t know what’s happened in this system over the past two hundred years, so something might have thrown it off even if we’re right . . .”

Leah hadn’t wanted to leave the ops position, not while
Intrepid
was still missing, with Geordi and the others aboard. Eventually, Scotty had pointed out to her that she’d be no good to anyone if she fell asleep at her post, and sent her to rest and eat. All of the bridge crew had stayed on duty well past what should have been the end of their shifts, and her going was the trigger for everyone else to realize that they were allowed to stand down and trust the beta shift team.

Without thinking about it, Leah found her way to Nelson’s, where Guinan was sitting by the huge windows, leaving her shaven-headed and maroon-blazered deputy to look after the few people who needed anything.

“You look like you’ve got a lot of weight on your shoulders,” Guinan said.

“Eleven people and a historical treasure in the hands of a time-traveling conman and a vengeful Ferengi mercenary. I’d call that cause to worry.”

Guinan nodded sympathetically.

“It’s just that . . .” Leah shrugged. “If it was a drive technology problem, or an engine design problem, I know I could do something. Find a solution. But this . . .” She
rested her head in her hands. “This makes me feel like the most useless person on the ship.”

“Would you be surprised if I told you Scotty feels that way?”

“I don’t know that I’d believe you.”

“It’s true. I hear you’re doing well with the sensors. You knew what the Split Infinite was.”

“I just hope Geordi’s all right. And Reg, and the others.”

“I think they’ll be just fine. For now, anyway.”

“For now?”

“I think . . . I think things are going to become difficult for Geordi, and I think that’s why I came on board.”

“You think?”

“I feel, rather than think. It’s a long story, Leah.”

Leah thought about what she’d heard about why Guinan left the
Enterprise.
“The Nexus, right?”

“A part of you never leaves the Nexus. I see, hear, and have memories of things that have happened, and of things that haven’t happened yet, but could. And I remembered a moment of being on a starship with Geordi, when he learned . . . Well, never mind. It wasn’t a memory of today.”