I,Q

by John de Lancie

  “Big Arnold, sir?”

  Picard nodded. “A massive swordfish. This big . . . no . . . this big,” and he readjusted his arms to encompass the entirety of the creature he was describing. “They say he’s so big that he can haul your ship halfway to Bermuda before you know what’s hit you. Big Arnold has thwarted the dreams of every fisherman in these parts. But today, Data . . . today is definitely the day.”

  “Did you program it to be the day, sir?”

  “I programmed randomness, Mr. Data. We are sportsmen, after all. There’s no fun in forcing the fish to come to you through computer imperatives. If we find him, we find him, and if we don’t, we don’t. But I’m betting,” and he rubbed his hands together in anticipation, “that today is our day!”

  “You do not appear relaxed, Captain,” Data said. “Your body seems tense, actually.”

  “Anticipation and relaxation aren’t mutually exclusive, Data.”

  “Is this another topic relating to point of view, Captain?”

  “I would say that’s a fair assessment, Mr. Data, yes. Then again, all topics relate to point of view, don’t they? It’s all in how we see the universe: You, I, the fish, all of us.”

  “They are widely disparate viewpoints,” Data pointed out. “For example, since you are fond of discussing fish, it should be noted that they possess a memory of approximately 2.93 seconds. Were you aware that if you put two goldfish in a bowl, upon meeting, their dialogue would sound something like this? ‘Oh, what a surprise. Nice to meet you.’ Then they would swim on. Thirty seconds later, having completely for- gotten the previous meeting and finding themselves face to face again, they would say, ‘Oh, what a surprise. Nice to meet you!’ It seems a rather pointless existence, since all knowledge is transitory and, as a consequence, meaningless.”

  “Look at it another way,” Picard said. “Every minute crammed with discovery! Never a dull moment. One surprise after another.”

  “But they never learn, sir. A life without acquisition of knowledge is a meaningless life. I am aware of some humans who go through life never learning and never forgetting. It would seem fish go through life never learning and never remembering. I do not think that is good.”

  “I don’t know about that, Data. Who are we to say that the way we go through life is in any way superior to what a fish experiences?”

  “As you said, sir, we are the ones on this end of the fishing line.”

  Picard laughed. “Yes . . . yes . . . quite right . . .”

  At that moment, Picard’s fishing line snapped taut. There was a high-pitched “whizzing” sound as the line spooled out of the reel. Picard promptly belted himself into his seat and grabbed the rod. “We have a strike, Data!”

  “So it would seem, sir. Is there anything I should do?”

  “Pray!”

  About forty yards away something big broke the surface. “I think it’s him! Big Arnold himself!”

  “Are you sure, Captain?”

  At that moment, the fish leapt high into the air. He was massive, water glistening on his scaly hide. His long snout, like a rapier, pointed skyward before he plunged back into the sea.

  “Positive!” crowed Picard.

  For long minutes, Picard fought the fish, man against nature in microcosm. Data simply watched. Picard had stopped talking, except for occasionally muttering self-encouragement such as, “Come on, Picard, you can do it. He’s yours, he’s yours.”

  Fortunately, no one but Data was there to witness Picard’s bizarre murmurings.

  Suddenly the good ship Hornblower pitched sharply in the direction of the struggling fish. Picard was genuinely surprised that the creature was capable of putting up such a fight.

  The ship lurched a second time, then a third. The fourth time, the whole ship began to move backward, jolting Picard from his supreme confidence, ever so slightly.

  “Shall I activate the engines, sir?” asked Data.

  “No . . . no, it’s all right. Let him wear himself out. He can’t pull us forever.” But there was doubt in Picard’s voice, notable in that anything approaching humility was a rarity for Picard.

  The ship continued its backward motion, faster and faster. Picard held resolutely to the rod. “Something’s wrong,” he said. “Something is very wrong. I don’t think it’s the fish that’s pulling us.”

  “Then what is, sir?”

  “I don’t know . . .” There was a large knife in a bracket along the nearby wall. “I hope I don’t regret this,” he said, reaching for the knife to sever the line. But suddenly, the line snapped on its own, and Big Arnold was gone. Fortunately for him, in 2.93 seconds he would forget any contact he’d ever had with Picard. Lucky fish, that one.

  However, the Hornblower did not slow down. If anything, it sped up. Something was pulling it farther and faster out to sea.

  The skies above them began to darken, and a stiff wind rose. The seas became confused, surging furiously. Anything that wasn’t fastened down rolled about the deck. Picard looked at the massive thunderheads rolling in. “What in hell is going on?” he demanded.

  “You did indicate random elements in the program, sir,” Data pointed out with admirable sangfroid.

  “I know, I know, but this . . . ?” He waved his arms about like a confused scarecrow. “I didn’t program this. . . .”

  “Captain, we are no longer moving in full reverse,” Data informed him. “We are now angling approximately thirty degrees to port, and our speed is increasing.”

  “Engines on-line, Mr. Data! Quickly, if you wouldn’t mind.”

  Data fired up the engines, but even at full bore, there was no change in direction. The sound of the engines was now completely lost in the howling of the wind and the rumbling of thunder overhead. The ship’s propellers slowed the vessel for only a few moments and then the pull of the sea overwhelmed them again.

  “Captain!” Data’s voice cut through screaming wind. “Whirlpool, dead ahead!”

  “Whirlpool?” Picard glanced over his shoulder in astonishment.

  The whirlpool was immense—miles wide. It let out a roar like a million souls howling for redemption. Its interior was the inkiest black. It dragged the Hornblower, as well as everything else, toward its maw. The ship had no means of escape.

  At this point, Picard clearly had had enough, and decided to play his trump card. “End program!” he shouted above the screeching wind.

  Nothing. His instruction to the holodeck didn’t register at all. He might as well not have said anything. “End program!” he bellowed, even louder than before.

  Still nothing. The holodeck ignored him.

  “Captain!” Data called to him. “Permission to be unrelaxed, sir!”

  Picard didn’t bother to answer; he was trying to think, his thoughts racing, tumbling over one another in a barely controlled torrent. Abandoning ship was not an option. For some reason the holodeck appeared intent on turning what was to be a casual day of fishing into a nightmare, and there wasn’t a single thing he could do about it.

  The Hornblower was now caught on the outer rim of the whirlpool. From that point on, it was only a matter of time before the ship would be swallowed completely. The ship began to spin about in ever-tightening circles.

  As he looked into the whirlpool, he could see hundreds, thousands of objects, spiraling down, down. “What in the name of God . . . ?” he shouted, but the rest of his famous last word were lost as he, Data, and his ship plunged into the blackness below.

  Fishing on Dante IX . . .

  Fishing on Dante IX is quite different from what Picard and Data had been doing on the Holodeck of the Enterprise. As a matter of fact, the term “deep-sea fishing” on Dante IX is so literal, it’s downright comical. Let me briefly explain. We of the Q, you see, can go wherever we wish, and whether it’s the depths of space or the bottom of an ocean is of no matter one way or the other.

  The fish on Dante IX are monstrous compared to the relatively puny creatures Picard was hunting. T
hey make their homes at the bottom of the ocean, never getting near the surface at all. Consequently, not only do the residents of Dante IX never eat fish, but many of them don’t even believe that fish exist, having never seen them.

  But they do exist. And they make fine eating.

  Of course, being a member of the Q Continuum, I don’t have the same need for sustenance that Picard and his ilk require. But that doesn’t mean I’m incapable of enjoying a fine delicacy when it’s available. I could, naturally, just will the creature onto a plate, but where’s the sport in that?

  So my family and I went “deep-sea fishing” this fine day; and we were doing it while standing at the bottom of the ocean—that’s the “deep-sea” part. My family, by the by, consisted of myself, my wife (to whom I shall refer for your convenience as Lady Q, although we tend to address each other simply as Q since we all know who we are), and my son, whom I hereby designate as little “q.”

  The Lady Q is a rather brassy individual, with a low tolerance for foolishness of any kind—most particularly mine, if truth be told. But although she displays little patience for me, she dotes endlessly (some would say nauseatingly) upon our son, q. I can hardly blame her. Young q maintains a unique position in the universe—to say nothing of history—in that he is the first Q born within the Continuum. The closest before that was Amanda Rogers, and she was conceived and raised on Earth . . . the poor thing.

  As a result, Lady Q takes the responsibility of his upbringing most seriously. As for me, my position is that “all work and no play” makes for a dull boy. Needless to say (but I’ll say it anyway), harmony is not a constant in our household.

  At this particular point in time, q was the equivalent of ten Earth years old. He was, of course, far ahead of that in actual development. A young omnipotent being is hardly the same creature as a young mere mortal. Still, he had a good deal of learning to do, and I was doing my level best as his father to instruct him in the many splendors and varieties of experience the universe had to offer. The Lady Q, however, felt obligated to keep a sharp eye on him . . . and, more than likely, on me. Her perpetual suspicion of me is a trait that I have chosen (because I have no other choice, really) to find endearing. There are times she is as cuddly as Lady Macbeth! So when q was intrigued with the idea of deep-sea fishing on Dante IX (I had regaled him with tales of my youth), she chimed in that she was game for fishing as well. Frankly, I’m convinced she was motivated more by the principle of spying on me than by any real interest in fishing.

  So there we were, the three of us, comfortably situated on the ocean floor, rods in our hands, and the fishing lines floating a good two hundred feet or so above us. The Dante IX fish are rather clever, you see . . . at least, clever as far as fish go. So I decided the best plan was to get right down in the goo and let our hooks dangle up from the bottom. They would never expect us coming from that direction. So far none of the fish had gone for the bait, but I was quite certain that they would before long.

  “I almost feel sorry for them, Father,” said q.

  “Why?”

  “They don’t have a chance against us. We’re of the Q Continuum, and they’re just fish.”

  “That’s their lot in life, son,” I replied. “Just because they’re fish doesn’t mean that we have to feel sympathy for them.”

  “It doesn’t hurt to do so,” Lady Q said blithely. She had a rather offhand way of speaking when she was contradicting me, something she did quite often. “Having sympathy for lower life-forms is a good habit to learn.”

  “My, aren’t we the sentimentalist today?” I said.

  “My darling Q,” said the Lady, between clenched teeth, “might I remind you that the times in your life you’ve gotten into the most trouble have been caused precisely by a lack of sympathy for lower life-forms?”

  “Your mother is exaggerating.”

  “Your mother is doing nothing of the kind,” said Lady Q.

  “What sort of trouble did you get in, Father?” asked q. His eyes were wide with excitement.

  “Well . . .” I shifted uncomfortably on the silt of the ocean floor. I didn’t like the way the conversation was going. “There was that time when the Continuum . . .”

  “Go on,” she said.

  “. . . was miffed . . . and we had a falling out.”

  “They took away his powers,” she said with excessive cheerfulness.

  “They did!” He looked amazed, his eyes widening to the point that they threatened to abandon his face. “What was that like?! Were you scared? You must have been scared!”

  “I was . . . disconcerted. But not scared. Never scared.” I looked at Lady Q, as if daring her to contradict me once more.

  Her features softened into a smile. “He was not scared,” she agreed, looking at me with—dare I say it—genuine admiration. “I will give him that. I have seen your father in many different situations. I’ve seen him angry, petulant, upset, arrogant . . . but afraid? Never.”

  “And you never will,” I said, secretly grateful for this ringing, if not entirely candid, endorsement.

  Then, to my surprise, q reached over and—still holding on to his line—hugged me impulsively. I wasn’t quite sure how to react to it. Physical contact has never been my forte. “What’s this about?” I asked.

  “For being the bravest father in the universe,” he said, and he looked up at me in that trusting manner that only children can muster. The kind of manner that makes you feel as if you’re the entirety of their universe. “Promise you’ll never leave us.”

  “I can’t promise that, q. There are always matters I have to attend to . . .”

  “Promise . . . you’ll never leave us alone.”

  There was an urgency to the request that I could readily understand.

  No one should be left alone. The solitude, the emptiness—what it does to the mind and spirit—there is nothing in the universe worse than that. You may think there is . . . but there isn’t. Not really.

  “I will never leave you alone. Not ever, I promise,” I said firmly. “In fact, I . . .”

  At that moment, I got a good yank on my fishing line. I looked up and a creature only slightly smaller than your average whale had hooked onto my lure.

  “Get him, Father!” crowed my son.

  Naturally, I could have reeled him in, but I decided to make a bigger moment of it than it truly had to be. The things we do to amuse our children. And so I allowed the creature to yank me entirely off my feet. He kept on swimming, moving quickly, as if he had a chance in the world of escaping from the hook that had lodged solidly in his mouth. I dangled behind him, waving my hands rather comically and showing off, crying out, “Oooo! Ooo! Whatever am I going to do?!”

  I was rewarded with peals of laughter from my son, and an amused-but-silent shaking of the head by Lady Q. It was all quite comical as I pretended to be terror-stricken and I found, to my surprise, that it was fun. It brought me—dare I say it—pleasure.

  Understand, I had never anticipated having any affinity for child rearing. Intellectually, I understood all the reasons it should be done, but I was far more concerned with the impact it would have on the Q Continuum. The Continuum had become far too complacent; indeed, it was positively stodgy. New blood was desperately needed. And when one wants to liven things up, there is nothing quite like the pitter-patter of little feet down the spaceways.

  Nevertheless, secretly I had regarded the child as a means to an end. I am not, by nature, an affectionate person. The notion of being a caring father who paid attention to and even doted on a child frankly never occurred to me. It was such an unlikelihood that it never warranted serious consideration.

  Yet here we were, or at least here I was. There was something in the way the boy looked at me that stirred something within. Perhaps it was the sheer idolization and awe he radiated. Perhaps it was his unspoken ambition to grow up and be just like his father. Perhaps it was . . .

  Perhaps it was . . .

  . . . that I h
ad no recollection of any father myself.

  Not father nor mother.

  It is not a subject upon which I choose to dwell, at least not at this time.

  In any event, I had come to realize that there was a void within me that I did not know existed. I would not have let someone like Picard, for instance, know of such a thing. He would be entirely too smug, or would make cloying and overly cute comments about my displaying a “human side.” I suppose it’s simply part of the overwhelming human need to see aspects of humanity no matter where it looks, as if the universe were humanity’s mirror and humanity had an urge to admire itself and preen in front of it.

  At least we members of the Q Continuum have reason to be arrogant and self-satisfied; we have reason to preen. We really are superior, as opposed to humans, who simply think they are.

  All in all, it was best if Picard and his emotional brethren remained eternally unaware that their “nemesis,” their “trickster god,” their “own personal demon” had a disgustingly soft spot that could only be described as humanesque in its makeup. No, I certainly didn’t need the aggravation of smarmy comments rolling off Picard’s lips. Granted, Janeway of the Voyager had an inkling, but they were sufficiently isolated so that my reputation would remain untarnished.

  So there I was, being “dragged” by the fish. The great beast swam this way and that, doing everything he could to shake me loose. Naturally, since he was dealing with something beyond his extraordinarily limited experience, disengaging from me was simply not an option. The sounds of my son’s laughter, and the amused chuckles from my spouse, followed me as the creature thrashed about more and more. I willed my weight to treble, and then to increase exponentially, and slowly my vastly increased mass brought the exertions of the wayward fish to a halt.

  I was about to reel in the leviathan when I noticed that the water was flowing against me—quickly. I, all of a sudden, had the feeling of being in a river, a very swiftly moving river.

  This was nothing short of astounding. Dante IX only had one small moon. Certainly whatever effect it had on the planet’s ocean wasn’t sufficient to cause this sort of tidal action. No, it most definitely was not the moon that was causing this anomaly. And there were no storms on the surface . . . so, what could it be?