Miracle Workers

by Keith R. A. DeCandido

  Admittedly, part of it was the fault of the ever-substandard Nalori equipment. At least one of the rifles was on the wrong setting.

  But still—how the hell can you miss something at point-blank range?

  The shii took the bait we laid out. I activated the force field. The shii realized it was trapped and started making this squeaky noise. I gave the order to fire.

  And they missed.

  Worse, one of them—Entorr, whose weapon was on the wrong setting—hit one of the bars. That weakened the steel enough so that it started to buckle. The shii must have noticed this—or maybe it would have attacked the bars anyhow. Either way, it sliced through one of the bars, leaving the three Nalori vulnerable—

  —especially since they panicked and started firing wildly instead of doing what they were supposed to do if something like this happened, which was run out the back door. I had made sure that there was a method of escape in case something like this happened, and they didn’t use it.

  I’ve been sending regular updates on the situation to the senate, including images of every attack of the shii. I’m really of two minds as to whether or not to send this one, as it makes all of us look like idiots.

  Naturally, everyone’s blaming me for the trap not working, even though it should have worked, if those three jackasses had done what they were supposed to do.

  Okay, that’s not fair. They panicked. It happens. But that panic got them killed.

  The last batch of messages included one from the da Vinci. Even though it’s time-stamped two days after I sent out the distress call, it makes no acknowledgment of it. I’ve continued to send it at each opportunity, so, with any luck, they will get it eventually. According to Kieran, things are going better—it turns out that there isn’t going to be a war, and the da Vinci has been assigned to help the folks at Deep Space 9 put the station back together. Fabian Stevens used to be assigned to DS9, so he’s probably happy about the assignment.

  Right now, I really wish I was back with them. I wish I could watch Fabian and Pattie crawl around a warp core with me, listen to Carol make one of her snide remarks, try to decipher Soloman’s chirpy computer-speak, watch Bart write a letter on paper to Anthony, hear Captain Gold go on about his grandchildren. Hell, I wouldn’t even mind listening to Corsi complain.

  But most of all, I miss Kieran’s smile. That dopey, aw-shucks smile that he always gets on his face when he decides to torture me by reminding me of when I spilled hot chocolate on Captain Picard.

  Work on the SA has crawled to a halt. The team that put the trap together is down to one person now, and he refuses to work. Nobody’s tried to steal the Culloden —mainly because of what happened last time—but nobody’s willing to work, or talk to me, either.

  I’m going to go to the camp hospital and sit on Dolahn until he gives me an autopsy report.

  Partial transcript of autopsy report of sample

  S019 (a.k.a. “monster shii”) by Dr. Dolahn,

  Sarindar Medical Unit, thirteenth day of

  Sendrak, twenty-third year of Togh

  DOLAHN: The creature also shows signs of—Ah, Commander Gomez, I was just going to summon you.

  GOMEZ: I see you’re actually working on the autopsy.

  DOLAHN: Don’t sound so surprised, Commander. I admit, I’ve been dilatory in getting to this, but caring for Kani and Rimlek has been difficult—I almost lost them a couple of times.

  GOMEZ: I’m sorry, Doctor, I didn’t realize . . .

  DOLAHN: Yes, well, there was no way you could’ve known. GOMEZ: Especially since you didn’t tell me. If you actually gave me reports . . .

  DOLAHN: [makes throat-clearing noise] Yes, well, be that as it may, I have begun the autopsy, and I’ve come to rather a shocking revelation.

  GOMEZ: What?

  DOLAHN: Whatever this creature is, it isn’t native to Sarindar.

  GOMEZ: But—

  DOLAHN: It may appear to be a shii—and rather a mutated one at that—but it isn’t. Take a look at this. Some of these match the way the internal organs of a shii are supposed to be arranged, but half of them aren’t even actual organs. I’ve been studying silicon-based life-forms for most of my career, and I can’t make heads nor feet out of any of th—

  GOMEZ: These aren’t organs.

  DOLAHN: I beg your pardon?

  GOMEZ: These aren’t organs.

  DOLAHN: What are you doing with that thing? I thought those Starfleet contraptions of yours were just glorified recording devices on this planet.

  GOMEZ: I’ve been able to modify this one to get at least partial readings, even with the chimerium. And, according to the readings I’m getting right now, these don’t behave like “proper” organs because they’re biomechanical.

  DOLAHN: Commander, most silicon-based life might read on a tricorder as “ biomechanical” due to the nature of their—

  GOMEZ: Doctor, contrary to the opinions of the Nalori government, I’m not stupid. I compensated for that. But this creature was never “alive” in the traditional sense. It’s an artificial life-form. In fact . . .

  DOLAHN: What is it?

  GOMEZ: If I’m reading this right, some of these “organs” are actually chameleon circuits. Some people at the Daystrom Institute were working on something like this, but they were never able to make it work.

  DOLAHN: For those of us who don’t follow every move of the Daystrom Institute, Commander, what, exactly, is a chameleon circuit?

  GOMEZ: It’s something that allows a mechanism to change its outer form. You program it to alter its appearance. The problem is, the power demands to let something with an unstable molecular structure perform stable mechanical functions were always way in excess of what was practical. Whoever built this was able to solve that. This is amazing.

  DOLAHN: Why would anyone build something like this?

  GOMEZ: I don’t know. But this changes everything. I need to study these circuits, see if I can figure out the programming.

  DOLAHN: What, you’re going to work here?

  GOMEZ: Unless you have a better idea, Doctor. I won’t have the space to do this in my tent, and this is the closest we have to a lab in the camp.

  DOLAHN: Fine, if you must, but please stay out of my way.

  First officer’s log, Commander Sonya Gomez, planet Sarindar, Stardate 53288.6

  I have left Razka and J’Roh in charge of what remains of the project—apparently, the crew working on the mining mechanics have been throwing themselves into their work, on the premise that it’s better than waiting for something to kill them. Everyone else is sulking in their tents. I, meanwhile, have spent the last twenty-eight hours trying to figure out what makes the “ monster shii” tick. And, I’m happy to say, I think I’ve found it.

  I’ve been able to extract a visual record from the creature’s “eyes”—actually, recording devices. It took a while for me to determine how to read the things—I finally managed it by constructing an image translator, cannibalizing parts from Dr. Dolahn’s X-ray machine, of all things.

  Some time in the past—it’s impossible to be sure how far, as the manner in which this mechanism tells time doesn’t have an obvious analogue to Federation or Nalori timekeeping—an expedition of aliens came to Sarindar. I can’t say what they were called—the universal translator renders the references to them as simply “the owners”—but the two shii were the protectors for the expedition. Their job was to keep them safe and gather food for them.

  The owners are quadrupedal beings who look, at first glance, like a hybrid between seals and dogs—but, honestly, they don’t look like anything I’ve ever seen before. The expedition seemed to be a simple archaeological survey.

  However, I noticed, as time went on, that the owners looked weaker and gaunter—and that there were fewer and fewer of them. My best guess is that they succumbed to some kind of disease. After a certain amount of time, they were gone.

  If the shii—the protectors had taken on a large-scale version of the fo
rm of shii when they arrived on Sarindar—had any notion of what had happened to the owners, they gave no indication of it. They simply continued carrying out their duties.

  Those duties included gathering food. The owners, I soon realized, fed on the cranial matter of animals.

  This explains the hoarding of heads and the discarding of the bodies. In their minds, they’re still gathering food for their masters, despite the fact that those masters are never going to return.

  Personal log, Commander Sonya Gomez, planet Sarindar, Stardate 53288.9

  I’ve been working on a way to try to communicate with the “shii.” I’ve moved to my tent, since the doleful looks from Dolahn (pardon the pun) have gotten tiresome. The work Bart Faulwell did in upgrading the universal translators to understand Bynar speech, when they commune with computers or with each other, has turned into a boon. Most of that work was programmed into my da Vinci-issue tricorder, so I was able to start building a language algorithm for the shii.

  Razka came by to give me a report, and asked me what I was doing. I explained it to him—including what I’d learned about our attacker.

  “Why do you want to talk to it?”

  “To convince it to stop. It doesn’t realize that it’s doing anything wrong. If we can explain to it that its masters are dead and it doesn’t have to hoard food for them anymore, maybe we can get it to leave us alone.”

  “To what end? Commander, this is pointless. These are simple automatons. You no more ‘killed’ anything last week when you shot the first shii than I did when I crashed my father’s hovercraft when I was a child.”

  “Razka, I appreciate—”

  “Commander, you are an engineer. So are most of the men working here. When a piece of equipment malfunctions, you turn it off.”

  “No, you try to fix it. Razka, I really do understand what you mean, but I can’t just condemn this thing without giving it a chance to stop. I killed the first one in self-defense—maybe if I can talk to it—”

  Razka laughed. “You’re even calling the creature ‘it.’” Then he grew serious. “Let me put it another way, Commander. You are in charge of this project. This project has been endangered by these two creatures. Don’t you owe it to the men you’re responsible for to do whatever you can to safeguard them? Yes, it’s true, this thing has been left without any kind of guidance, and it’s simply following its programming. But Kejahna, Rimlek, Entorr, G’sob, D’Ren, and the others are all dead. You yourself commended their mazza to the Shigemos. What of them?”

  I found I didn’t have an answer to that.

  He left.

  I went back to work. Maybe he was right. But the next time I saw that thing, I was going to try to talk to it.

  Him. Her. Whatever.

  First officer’s log, Commander Sonya Gomez, planet Sarindar, Stardate 53289.1

  All requests to the Nalori senate have gone unanswered. There is also no reply from the da Vinci or anyone else from Starfleet. The sonic barrier that we erected around the camp has failed. The sonic rifles issued to the Nalori were not designed for such sustained use. One of them had a breakdown in the control unit when the coils overheated. The fact that they even use coils instead of an EPS system is an indication of how substandard they are.

  Unfortunately, the breakdown of one converted rifle caused a cascade reaction, and now it doesn’t work. I have managed to reconstruct parts of the barrier, but that makes it all but useless. Unless the barrier is “airtight,” as it were, the shii can get through with ease.

  The only way to properly fix the barrier is to cannibalize the remaining sonic rifles, but—even if I could convince the workers to give them up— that isn’t a viable option. They are our only defense against the creature.

  And, since the camp is no longer a safe haven, I need to take action.

  The trap would have worked if the shii had actually been hit with any of the shots fired at it. One thing that did work was the lure. So I’m going to try the lure again, this time in the camp hospital. It’s generally the most crowded place anyhow, so the shii would probably scope it out in any case. Meanwhile, I will move everyone to the space beneath the SA. Dolahn should be able to convert it to a makeshift hospital, and I’ll put the remaining armed workers on guard.

  Once that’s done, I’ll lure the shii with the ruby flowers and try to communicate with it. I’ve programmed my combadge so that its translator will render the machine language of the shii, based on what I could glean from the first one.

  Letter from Razka on Sarindar to Marig on Nalor, fifteenth day of Sendrak, twenty-third year of Togh

  My wife: Yes, another letter. Because once again I have been reminded of my mortality. Once again, I ask you to kiss my children for me before reading the rest of this letter. Thank you.

  Commander Gomez yesterday hit upon the idea of setting a lure for the monster shii. By the way, she has learned that this creature of legend is, in fact, a machine. It was programmed by strangers who came here on an expedition. The expedition members died, but the two shii lived on. These strangers fed on the brains of other living creatures. This is why the monster shii take the heads of men. They are gathering food for their dead masters. Tragic, in a way, especially given the number of good men who have had to die. In any case, Commander Gomez decided to lure the creature.

  A previous attempt to trap the monster failed, but she did succeed in luring it with a glemnar flower. So she cleared out the hospital and had Dr. Dolahn and J’Roh construct a new hospital under the subspace accelerator. This was sensible, as the old hospital was the easiest place to defend. The new hospital will be even easier to defend. So all the wounded and sick, the doctor, and all the remaining healthy people were moved to the new hospital. Commander Gomez remained behind at the old hospital. She liberally spread the glemnar flowers and waited. She felt that the monster shii would come to the hospital. Her plan was to try to talk to it. She thought she had come up with a way to do so. At least she was not foolish enough to try this without backup. She was armed with her Starfleet sonic rifle. All she had to do was wait until the monster came. We would wait in the hospital until it was safe.

  That, at least, was the theory. Unfortunately, the practice proved somewhat different. We had very few sonic rifles left. Mine, having gone completely unused since I was issued it, was one of them. Those of us who were armed stood guard at the two entrances to the hospital. One led to the dish, the other to the underground tubing. I was stationed, along with J’Roh, at the dish entrance. The other four were at the tubing entrance. This made sense. J’Roh was not a very good shot, and you know what I’m like with a weapon. It was very unlikely that the shii would come in through the dish, as it would have to climb up onto it and then slide to its center. The tubing provides a more direct access. That, therefore, had the best guard.

  Not that we thought it would matter, of course. We all assumed that Commander Gomez’s plan would work. Well, actually, I assumed that. So did J’Roh. He was the one to first call her “Sañuul” after she solved the riddle of the load-lifters. And so did some others. Most, however, thought that the plan was a foolish one. Many wanted it to work anyhow, but only so that the shii would kill Commander Gomez.

  In fact, I distinctly remember that part. Querti had just said, “If we’re lucky, the beast will take her bait and take that hideous head of hers off.” Then he started to say something else as Anilegna started to laugh. Then the entryway buckled, making an awful, tearing noise. Then a triangle-shaped claw ripped into Anilegna’s torso. As he coughed up blood, Querti lifted his rifle and made as if to fire. The claw, still stained with Anilegna’s blood and encrusted with his innards, continued its arc and ripped both the rifle and Querti’s hands to ribbons.

  Next to me, J’Roh aimed his sonic rifle at the door. Unfortunately, there was nothing to aim at. The shii hadn’t come all the way through, and the parts that had were blocked by Querti and by Anilegna’s remains. Not that it would have mattered to me. As before, I froz
e.

  Oddly, this time, I couldn’t hear the rifles firing, but I could hear Querti’s screams. People closer to me than he was were saying things. I think Dr. Dolahn cried out, and several people ducked under the beds, but I didn’t hear that. The shii ripped through the rest of the doorway, but I didn’t hear that, either. I continued to hear Querti’s screams, though.

  Once he had a clear shot, J’Roh fired his rifle. So did one of the other guards at the door. The second guard’s rifle literally exploded in his face. That, I did hear, as well as his screams, intermingled with Querti’s.

  A hole seemed to open up in the shii’s torso, but it didn’t slow down. It sliced the head of the first guard clean off, while the second guard continued to scream in pain. Then it got quiet for a moment. I noticed that the shii had cut Querti’s head off as well.

  Suddenly, sound exploded in my ears. Dolahn telling everyone to take cover. J’Roh screaming for me to shoot. The second guard still screaming in agony. And I still couldn’t move, couldn’t fire my weapon, couldn’t speak.

  I wanted to, Marig, that’s the worst thing. As loudly as J’Roh was screaming at me, I was screaming at myself. I tried to motivate myself to do something. But I could not budge. I told myself that the deaths of Kejahna, Kelrek, D’Ren, Entorr, and all the others had to be avenged. I told myself that others would die at any moment. I told myself that Commander Gomez had said that I was the one she trusted.