Star Trek: The Next Generation - 114 - Cold Equations: The Body Electric

by David Mack

  * * *

  Exhaustion had left Beverly Crusher’s limbs feeling as heavy as lead. She sprawled on the sofa in the main room of her family’s quarters, her head craned back beneath sloped windows that were shaded solid black—a defense against the death-flashes of stars being ripped into fiery spirals as they spun into Abbadon’s accretion disk. All was quiet except for the soft white noise of the ship’s life-support systems. After a day surrounded by wounded in sickbay and an evening of struggling to calm young René enough to get him to eat and settle down for the night, all she wanted was silence. No music, no distractions. Just solitude.

  Consequently, the irony of the chiming of her door’s visitor signal came as no surprise. She opened her eyes, sighed, and sat forward. “Come in.” The door unlocked and slid open with a hydraulic whisper. Light from the corridor silhouetted her guest as he stepped inside, but she recognized him instantly by the drape of his robes and his wild mane of hair. “Wesley!”

  Her son crossed the room to meet her as she sprang from the sofa and greeted him with open arms. He gave her a quick but comforting hug. “Are you and René all right?”

  It still startled her to see him with a full, ragged beard. “We’re fine. You?”

  A nod. “I’m good.” He slipped from her embrace and took in the room. “I’m guessing negotiations with the Machine didn’t go well.”

  “Good guess.” She gestured toward the replicator. “Can I get you something?”

  He shook his head. “No, thanks.” His eyes moved around the room, as if he was searching for something. There was an evasiveness to his manner that concerned Crusher.

  “Wesley, are you sure you’re all right? You seem . . . distracted.”

  A half smile put a dimple in his left cheek, a telltale sign that he was preoccupied with troubling thoughts. “In case Captain Picard and the crew can’t find a way to stop the Machine, I thought it might be a good idea if we had a backup plan ready.”

  She didn’t like the sound of that. “What kind of backup plan?”

  “We could pack some essentials for you and René onto my ship. If it starts to look like the Machine is going to finish its mission, I could shift you out of here—to another galaxy, if necessary. Someplace safe.”

  Anger and shock collided and left Crusher agape. “Abandon my husband? Not to mention the crew of the Enterprise, and everyone else who depends on me? Have you lost your mind?”

  “Mom, if you stay here after the Machine collides those two singularities, you’ll be trapped. Without warp drive, everyone on this ship will die of old age before it reaches the nearest habitable star system. Unless the captain wants to push the ship to relativistic speed, in which case you might all live long enough to return to Federation space . . . in the year 29,500, by which point the radiation wave from the core will have sterilized the galaxy of organic life. I’m offering you a way out.”

  His proposition was so appalling that she almost had to laugh. “No, Wesley. Absolutely not. I won’t abandon everyone I know. What kind of life would that be?”

  “Longer.”

  “And emptier.” Her temper surfaced and slipped from her control. “Instead of thinking up ways to run, why don’t you focus on stopping the Machine? You have all these amazing abilities, but you expect me to believe there’s nothing you can do to help us fight this thing?”

  He scrunched his face in offended confusion. “Like what?”

  “Can’t you affect time and space and energy? You can fling starships across the cosmos. Why can’t you use those abilities to get rid of that thing?” She could see she had struck a nerve.

  “It doesn’t work that way. Travelers are guides and teachers, not supermen. I can’t force anyone through space-time. All I can do is assist the journeys of others who want my help.”

  She crossed her arms, fighting to contain her fury. “Even when something’s trying to destroy you? You can’t act in self-defense?”

  The more she pressed him, the more frustrated he became. “My talents aren’t weapons, Mom! They’re gifts. I can share them, but that’s all. I can’t bend the universe to my will, or interfere in the free will of others. This is part of why the Travelers teach a philosophy of neutrality and nonviolence. Sometimes we’ll intercede and try to avert conflicts, like we did with the Machine, but if it turns into a battle, the Travelers don’t get involved.”

  “So you think of yourself as a Traveler first and a human being second? If at all?”

  As soon as she’d said it, she regretted it. His guilty expression made it clear that her words had cut to the heart of him. “My talents aren’t destructive in nature. It’s not that I don’t want to help. It’s that there are only so many ways in which I can. Helping you and René reach safety is one of the few things I can still do for you. But if you won’t let me do that . . . then I’ll have to respect your choice, because I literally can’t save you against your will.”

  “Wes, I’m sorry. I just . . . I don’t know. I’m just not ready to give up yet.”

  He nodded slowly, resigning himself to her decision. “I understand. But if this turns into a fight for survival, I don’t think it’s one you can win. Sometimes, fighting isn’t the answer.”

  “Neither is running away from everything we stand for and everyone we care about. The only constant in the universe is death, but we can’t dwell on that. If we want our lives to mean something, we have to strive for more than mere survival and try to see the big picture.”

  To her surprise, he met her appeal with a low, bitter laugh. “Trust me,” he said, his voice low and distant, as if his thoughts were a billion light-years away. “I’ve seen a much bigger picture than you could ever know—and the truths it contains are more terrifying than you can imagine.” He turned to leave but stopped in the open door and looked back. “If you change your mind, let me know. But once the Machine is finished, there won’t be anything I can do for you.”

  14

  This day, it seemed to Picard, had no end of bad news. First had come the revelation of the Machine’s objective, then the staggering damage reports following their failed attempt at opening a dialog, and now the discovery that Data was a prisoner on a starship in some unknown sector of the galaxy. He looked across the master systems panel in main engineering at La Forge and Šmrhová, then glanced at Worf on his right. “So, where does this leave us?”

  “At war,” Worf said.

  Šmrhová added, “The Machine is unwilling to talk with us, and we can’t give it an AI negotiator it will listen to. Under the circumstances, we need to escalate to the use of force.”

  Wondering whether the opinion was unanimous among his senior officers, Picard fixed his stare on La Forge. “You concur?”

  The chief engineer gave a slow nod. “Yes, sir. I think we’ve run out of soft options.”

  Picard understood their reasoning, but he was reluctant to embrace their conclusion. “Considering the state of the Enterprise, a military engagement seems ill advised.”

  “We will not use the Enterprise,” Worf said. “An away team will deploy in the disarmed runabout Cumberland. Once inside the Machine, they will sabotage it.”

  Misgivings turned to skepticism as Picard considered that strategy. “That seems rather implausible, Number One. The Machine is quite literally the size of a planet. What possible sabotage could an away team inflict that would have any effect?”

  A knowing look passed between La Forge and Šmrhová. The security chief replied, “We’ve identified a number of key systems inside the Machine’s core control center. It would take a major detonation to do the job, but . . .” She shot a look back at La Forge.

  “We might have just the thing.” He called up a series of formulas and schematics on the table’s central display. “The away team will have to go in without any standard weaponry, or anything that would be recognizable as munitions. But we might be able to fool the Machine by having them use a trinary explosive compound.” He pointed out details in the weap
on’s design as he continued. “The various elements would all be brought in separately, by different members of the team. Unmixed, they would scan as harmless compounds. Even after the first two solutions are combined, they’ll still register as completely inert. But when the catalyst is added, it’ll kick off an unstoppable chain reaction that should be strong enough to cripple the Machine’s core.”

  “I see,” Picard said. He studied the plans. “Timed detonators, I presume?”

  La Forge nodded. “We figure a ten-minute countdown should be enough to get our team to minimum safe distance before detonation.”

  Forced to play devil’s advocate, Picard asked, “What if the Machine detects the bombs?”

  “That depends,” Šmrhová said. “If it doesn’t see the first binary compound as a threat, then it shouldn’t have time to expel the catalyst once the reaction starts. But if it sees through the ruse . . . this could go wrong in a heartbeat.”

  “That’s why I’ve scan-shielded the containers and delivery systems for the catalyst,” La Forge said. “Unless it has sensors that can penetrate chimerium, this should come as a surprise.”

  Picard decided to trust his officers’ judgment and move on. “How great a risk of collateral damage is there? Could we end up inflicting enough damage to destroy the Machine?”

  Worf shook his head. “It is not likely.”

  “How unlikely?”

  La Forge shrugged. “One in ten billion? Anyway, even if we do trigger some kind of domino effect that cripples the Machine, I think the worst-case scenario is that its wormholes would close and it would get sucked into Abbadon.”

  Šmrhová brandished a crooked frown. “That would be poetic justice.”

  “Be that as it may,” Picard said, “remember that we’re dealing with a highly advanced alien technology. Its power-generation systems and other workings are largely unknown to us, and we need to be ready for just about anything.”

  After a moment of thought, Worf said, “I will order Lieutenant Faur to move us farther from the Machine.” He looked at La Forge. “How far do you suggest?”

  “To be on the safe side? At least ten AU.”

  That sounded prudent to Picard. “Make it so.” Next in his sights was Šmrhová. “That leaves only the matter of who to send. Have you selected an away team?”

  “Yes, sir.” A few light taps on the control panel in front of her pulled up crew dossiers on the center screen. “Lieutenants Davila and Giudice are my top demolitions experts, and our best combat engineers are Lieutenant Obrecht and Ensign Jutron. I also want to send structural engineer Ensign Meidat and chemical engineer Lieutenant Pinkman. Last but not least, they might need to get out of there in a hurry, so they should have a top-notch pilot. I’d like to assign Ensign Scagliotti. She’s young, and I know she has a half-dozen reprimands for safety violations, but she’s exactly the kind of crazy-brave hotshot the away team might need.”

  “An excellent selection,” Picard said. “Who will be commanding the team?”

  “I will,” Šmrhová said. “With your permission.”

  Worf snapped, “Permission denied. This operation is too dangerous to risk sending a senior officer.” He looked at the dossiers. “Giudice has seniority. He will command the team.”

  Šmrhová shot an offended look at Picard. “Captain!”

  “Commander Worf is in charge of assigning away team personnel. The decision’s been made, Lieutenant.”

  “Aye, sir,” Šmrhová replied, avoiding eye contact as she simmered.

  Picard straightened and smoothed the front of his jacket. “I just want to make clear that I remain troubled by how quickly we’ve resorted to the use of force, and I fear for the possible consequences if this effort fails. But I know that we can’t just stand by and do nothing while the Machine drives our galaxy toward extinction.” He breathed a heavy sigh, and hoped he didn’t come to regret his next order. “Have the away team prepare for immediate deployment.”

  * * *

  The runabout Cumberland touched down inside the core of the Machine with a gentle bump that Lieutenant Randolph Giudice felt through the boots of his EVA suit. “Look sharp, folks.”

  Crowded into the small starship’s main passenger compartment, the rest of the away team checked one another’s environmental suits before inspecting their gear. As ordered, no one carried any weapons—a directive that left Giudice feeling only half-dressed as they prepared to launch a stealth attack. He rested a gloved hand on Ensign Ally Scagliotti’s shoulder. “Keep the engine running. If this op goes sideways, we might need to dust off double-quick.”

  The wide-eyed young woman, whose short hair was dyed half the colors of the visible spectrum, confirmed the order with a jaunty nod. “You got it, boss.”

  He moved aft to join the rest of the team. Lieutenant Peter Davila—a crew-cut, thirty-year Starfleet veteran—handed Giudice his helmet. “I don’t know about this, G. Way I see it, there’s a hundred ways this op can go wrong.”

  “Only a hundred? I knew our luck would improve one of these days.” He put on his helmet and gestured for Davila to check the air seals while he activated its transceiver. Davila gave Giudice a thumbs-up, and his suit’s holographic heads-up display confirmed that his comm circuit was open. He turned and looked at his team. Projected above each person’s head was their last name and range from Giudice’s position. So far, so good.

  Engineer Obrecht handed Giudice the detonation module. “If you’re lifting Canister B,” he said over the comm circuit, “try not to shake it. It doesn’t like that.”

  “Noted.” Giudice accessed the runabout’s interior controls and closed the emergency hatch to the cockpit. “Stand by. Depressurizing the main compartment now.” He thumbed the switch and watched the gauge register the dwindling air pressure inside the Cumberland. When it reached zero millibars, he unlocked and opened both side hatches. “Move out. Red Team to port, Blue Team to starboard.” He led Red Team out of the ship, and Davila led Blue Team.

  Attached to the hull of the runabout, in the spaces where its interchangeable mission modules normally would be, were six large canisters filled with the constituent ingredients of the trinary explosive compound, three on each side of the ship. Each was just over two meters tall and had a volume capacity of just over fourteen thousand liters. Giudice didn’t even want to imagine how much they must weigh; they had been loaded onto the runabout by industrial lifters aboard the Enterprise, and it would be up to the away team to detach them and shift them into position using handheld antigrav load-movers. It would be tricky at best, and a single misstep could result in an accident none of them would live to regret.

  Giudice retrieved an antigrav sled from an external equipment locker while Jutron and Meidat removed the canisters from the runabout’s chassis. Jutron, a massive female Chelon, grabbed each canister with her antigrav pads and braced herself while Meidat, a slender Efrosian male, released the magnetic couplings that held each enormous container in place. One by one, Jutron shifted them onto the antigrav sled. In less than three minutes, all three were ready to move.

  Giudice moved aft to steal a look around the runabout. “Blue Leader: sitrep.”

  “Ready to roll.” Davila backpedaled into view, guiding his team away from the runabout toward the assembly point he and Giudice had selected before departure.

  Waving his own team into motion, Giudice walked backward parallel to Davila. “All right, Red Team: Move out. Nice and easy.” Jutron and Meidat followed him, working together to steer the antigrav sled and keep it stable in transit. All around them, strange lights danced in the darkness of the Machine, brief flickers in an abyss of shadow. It was like being in the center of a hollow world, Giudice thought. The Machine’s yawning interior lacked the endless quality of open space, but it felt more vast and empty than any finite structure he had ever seen in his life. It’s like being inside a Dyson shell, but with worse lighting.

  Davila held up a fist, signaling Blue Team to stop, so Giudi
ce did the same once Red Team was parallel with them. Simple motions signaled the teams to converge and set their pallets down within centimeters of each other, grouping the canisters in two rows of three.

  Giudice waved Obrecht and Jutron toward the canisters. “Set it up.”

  The two engineers worked quickly, using lengths of pipe with independent valves to connect the canisters on each pallet. Pinkman the chemist moved between them, overseeing their work and making frequent checks of the gauges. Giudice felt like an obsessive-compulsive as he repeatedly glanced at the chrono on his suit’s forearm, sweating each passing moment. Even though the process felt as if it were crawling like a bug trapped in amber, it was finished more than forty-five seconds ahead of schedule. Obrecht gave him a thumbs-up. “Good to go.”

  “Pinkman,” Giudice said, “you’re up.”

  The trim young chemical engineer opened the valve linking Blue Team’s first two canisters, and then he opened the valve between Red Team’s first canisters. “Mixing reactants.”

  Numerals on the canisters’ status displays changed faster than Giudice could see. None of it seemed to faze Pinkman, who nodded. “Okay, this is looking good. Sixty seconds to full mix.”

  Compliments were forming in Giudice’s thoughts—then everything started moving.

  Protrusions on the walls, parts of the overhead, sections of the floor—it all came alive. Pieces broke away, propelled by unseen forces. Chunks of machinery trailing wires like viscera, creeping machines that looked like steel spiders out of a nightmare, rolling wheels edged with blades of fire, and mechanical horrors Giudice didn’t even know how to describe: they all were converging in a swarm upon the away team, even as the deck started to vanish from under them.

  “Fall back!” He sprinted toward the runabout. “Move!”

  A metallic tendril snapped around his midriff like a steel bullwhip and yanked him backward. He twisted as he fell and landed hard on his stomach.

  Screams crackled with static through the open comm.