I,Q

by John de Lancie

  “I feel the need to—” Data began.

  But he was drowned out. The audience was picking up the chant. “His fault! His fault!” It was beginning to feel rather hot in the great hall of justice. My shirt was soaked with perspiration. The onlookers had their hands raised in fists and were shaking them, rhythmically and angrily.

  “Your Honor. . . it appears that . . .” Data tried to get a sentence out, but the rising din made it impossible. Finally he lapsed into silence, watching the fury building all around us. Picard was taking it all in, his concern growing with each passing moment.

  And then, not only to my shock but to the surprise of Picard as well, Data shouted.

  This was no ordinary shout, mind you. Data was a machine, remember, and he came with a volume control—ten being loudest, except I’m sure we cranked it to eleven. “What are you people, stupid?!” His amplified voice bounded and rebounded off the upper reaches of the dome.

  I knew that Data carried within him an emotion chip. Although he was still quite reserved, I knew that he could access genuine human feelings when the mood suited him. But even I was surprised to see the android’s face twisted in a paroxysm of fury.

  “This is absurd!” he continued, not slacking off. The sheer volume of his voice was overpowering. “You are letting your emotions completely carry you away! What see is saying makes no sense at all! She is playing upon your anger, your overwhelming need to tear down what you do not understand! And looking around at the bunch of you, I would have to say that what you do not understand would fill volumes!”

  “Data—!” Picard said, dumbfounded.

  Data wasn’t slowing down. Instead, he advanced on M.

  “Why are you doing this? Why are you looking to foist blame off on Q? You have no basis for anything that you have said! It satisfies no rules of evidence whatsoever . . . !”

  And M lost whatever sense of self-possession she had. Her voice jumped over Data’s in volume. “The fact that I have said it makes it evidence, you stupid clod! My word is law here! I am the Adjudicator! This is my arena! And you—!”

  “And you are looking for someone to blame!” Data blasted right back, even louder than she. On his face was no semblance of the calm, discerning android that I had always known. He was a tiger. “Why is that, I wonder? Why are you so determined to blame him?” And he pointed at me. “I will tell you why! I will tell all of you why!” He turned and faced the masses, who seemed to have grown in number. Battered and ash-covered, they had congregated from all over everywhere to hear the exchange. The entire building seemed to be shaking.

  “You will tell them nothing! You know nothing!” M shouted. I happened to look up when she was talking, and I noticed that the dome overhead was shaking.

  “I know more than you want me to know! I have figured out what you are trying to hide!” Data faced the assemblage once more and, pointing at M, cried out, “She . . . she is responsible for it! She is the cause for the universe ending, and for all the suffering and turmoil that we are experiencing! She is causing it all, and she is seeking a scapegoat for her actions! She is the one! She is the reason for the End of Everything! Are you going to stand by and let her get away with this? Are you? Are you!? Look at you! Look at what she has done to you! Are you going to spend your last hours of life in fear, or are you going to take matters into your own hands and make a difference . . . well, are you?”

  The crowd went berserk. What a performance!

  With a unified roar, they surged forward. M turned to face them, her guards linked arms serving as a barrier. But the crowd would not be stopped. The guards staggered back and fell to the ground. The guards’ armor shattered, and to everyone’s surprise, there was no one inside. They were all empty shells.

  The restraint on my mouth suddenly gave way and fell to the floor. The dome began to sway back and forth as dust and plaster rained down from overhead. The crowd let out a mighty cry and began to stampede the stage.

  M was attacked from all sides. She fought viciously, but the mob swallowed her up. It was as if she had derived her strength from the anger directed at others; but when she herself was the target, it created a “bounceback” against which she had no defense.

  “How dare you?!” she howled. “Stay away from me or I’ll . . . I’ll . . .” But they didn’t heed her warnings.

  The dome continued to shake, and huge chunks of stone fell to the floor. Cracks in the foundation were opening beneath my feet. I tried to get away, but they seemed to pursue me as if they had a life of their own.

  I briefly glimpsed M tearing herself free of the mob. Her clothes were ripped, her hair disheveled, and when she saw me there was such hatred, such anger in her face that I laughed. But M was hardly sharing in my perception of the moment’s more humorous aspects. There was fire in her eyes. I do not mean that metaphorically; I mean there was actual fire in her eyes. Whereas before she had managed to contain her anger, this time it consumed her. Her entire body erupted in flames. What a sight it was. To this day I shall never forget her screams. The death scream of one who could not die.

  I wondered what my own screams would sound like and realized that the day might be coming soon when I was going to find out.

  There was a rending and tearing all around, as if the very structure of the building could no longer stand to hold together. It shredded itself, the noise deafening, as if the very environment itself was consumed with fury.

  I looked up at the ceiling just as the great dome fell. I thought, The universe is dying and I’ve accomplished nothing . . . my wife, my child, they counted on me, this isn’t fair, this shouldn’t be happening, I would do anything to stop it. . . .

  Suddenly the floor opened up at my feet and I plunged into darkness . . . but I didn’t scream. I left such undignified behavior to M.

  I had, . . .

  I had, at that point, no expectations. I had no clear idea what was going to happen, or where, if anywhere, I was going to land. In other words, I was open to anything.

  Somehow, though, I wasn’t expecting to land facedown in a pile of hay.

  For a moment, the irony struck me, considering the stunt I had pulled on that parachutist all those centuries back. But then such thoughts fluttered away as I concentrated on other things, such as breathing. This was becoming a bit problematic, seeing as how I was facedown. The prospect of smothering to death in a stack of hay didn’t seem especially attractive.

  I struggled for a moment and quickly learned that it’s difficult to get leverage when you’re in a haystack. Every time I pushed my hand down for the purpose of raising myself up, all I did was sink down further. It was sort of a bristly quicksand. Eventually, though, I managed to flip myself over so that I was laying flat on my back, sucking in air that was refreshingly free of smoke. There was, however, the distinctive aroma of foul-smelling animals.

  I started to sit up and then yelped in a most undignified fashion. Reaching behind me, I pulled a needle out of my rump.

  “That figures,” I muttered and tossed the needle back into the stack for the next unsuspecting fool.

  I couldn’t quite believe after everything that had happened to me that I was in a haystack. It seemed so pastoral. The sky was so bright I had to shield my eyes. Then I realized there was no sun, just brightness.

  As I looked around I noticed I was in the midst of a vast outdoor marketplace lined with tents and small shops, each of them doing a fairly brisk business. I must confess, considering the last two places I had visited, it was a relief to be somewhere as benign as a bazaar. This marketplace was alive with spirit and excitement as people bargained enthusiastically over assorted knickknacks.

  Naturally, I was waiting for the other shoe to drop. If anything seemed to be constant in this nightmare, it was that.

  Something smelly, large, and warm bumped into the side of my face. I turned and saw a disgusting creature that looked like a cross between an earth camel and a Terwillian Dungoff. It stared at me with big brown eyes an
d then nudged me again. Apparently I was between it and its food.

  I got up and watched as the creature stuck its nose into the haystack and found, not two inches from where my face had just been, a nest of grubs that it devoured with relish—I would have used mustard. As I stood watching, I heard a shout from the other side of the haystack, “Merde! Who put this damned needle here!”

  “Picard!” I exclaimed, and sure enough, it was. He stepped from around the haystack, his bald head glistening in the light and, a moment later, Data emerged next to him. They looked as surprised as I.

  “Q! You made it! How—?”

  “I’m beginning to think, Picard, that the entire purpose of this adventure is to pile as many enigmas, mysteries, and confusions upon us as possible, to see how much we can stand,” I said, looking around. Then I stared at Data a moment. He looked calm and levelheaded, not remotely approaching what he’d been a short time before. “Are you feeling a bit more composed now, Mr. Data?”

  “I . . . ‘feel’ . . . perfectly fine, thank you,” Data said calmly.

  “It was a wonderful performance, Data, and I hope we will have no need to call upon you again,” I said.

  But Picard was at once both impressed and concerned with his android. “Yes, what happened to you back there, Data? I’ve never seen you in such a state.”

  “Nor have I, sir. Indeed, my decision to access my emotions as part of such histrionics dovetails with a theory that I am developing as to our present situation.”

  “I’m all ears,” I said.

  “Very well. In analyzing this odyssey upon which we have embarked, I am reminded of the studies of a twentieth-century doctor, one Doctor Kübler-Ross. She observed that in coping with the prospect of death, terminal patients went through five stages: disbelief or denial; anger; bargaining; despair; and finally, acceptance. We are faced with not only the imminent threat of our own demise, but the death of the entire universe—not a small issue. What we are experiencing as we progress on this journey is an actualization—a physical realization—of the steps a terminal patient experiences on his journey towards death. Each step or level or realization is defined by a different realm, and each realm is inhabited by those beings who are either passing through or are stuck therein.

  I stared at him. “Wonderful. If I understand you correctly, we’re trapped in a giant metaphor.”

  “I would not put it quite that simplistically, but to all intents and purposes, yes. That is correct.”

  “Data, that’s absurd,” I said.

  Picard turned to look at me. “Do you have a better explanation?”

  “Yes. The explanation is that the universe is insane, has always been insane, and in its death throes, its insanity is achieving new glorious heights of lunacy. But at this point, I don’t care about where we are or why we’re here. The only thing I care about is . . .”

  Then I stopped. I felt something.

  When someone loses a limb—an arm, a leg, whatever—oftentimes they can still feel it even after it’s gone. Phantom pains, it’s called. The lost arm feels itchy even though it’s moldering in a trash can somewhere; the knee is cramping even though there’s no leg to stand on. Phantom pains.

  I felt it. An eerie sensation, a tingling, a sense that I could reach out and touch something that had been severed from me. And I felt it so strongly, so surely, that I knew it was more than a mere mental illusion.

  “My son,” I said. “He’s here. My son, q, is here somewhere.”

  “Where?” asked Picard.

  “What part of the word ‘somewhere’ don’t you understand, Picard?” I snapped testily. “I don’t know exactly where he is. He could be in a tent, he could be walking around, but he’s somewhere here, at this level.”

  “And his mother?”

  I shook my head. “No. No, she is not here, she is . . . elsewhere. And please don’t ask me where elsewhere is. There’s only so much obtuseness I should have to tolerate in a day . . . even in a place where days and nights are irrelevant.”

  “How do you know?” asked Data.

  “Because . . . he’s an itch. An itch I can almost scratch.”

  “Phantom pains,” said Picard.

  “Very good, Jean-Luc. It’s like those times when you’re found with an occasional urge to brush your hair.”

  Data was still pondering the hair joke when Picard asked, “Which direction do you suggest we go first?”

  I looked around thoughtfully. “When one wants to get the most answers, the best place to go is where there are the most people.”

  I pointed to a spire a few hundred yards away. “My guess is that that spire is the heart of the marketplace; let’s find out.”

  “As good a place as any,” Picard agreed, and we immediately set out.

  Along the way, people called to us from tents and storefronts, trying to get us to sample their wares. “Here! Over here!” they would bellow. “The best bargains in town! You won’t be sorry!” We ignored them all, instead focusing our attention on the spire.

  It wasn’t long before we arrived. The spire was attached to a large, colorful tent. A line of beings from everywhere in the universe extended from the main door of the tent out into the marketplace. My inclination was to cut to the front of them.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” Picard asked.

  “To the front.”

  “There are other people here.”

  “So?” I said impatiently.

  Picard sighed. “Q . . . look around. There are a lot of people, and some of them are quite big, and their knuckles are dragging on the ground, which does not bode well. Do you think that perhaps, just for once, we might want to consider avoiding a fight? Because frankly, I’m getting a bit worn out.”

  I understood what he meant. It seemed a reasonable request, and furthermore, the line seemed to be moving quickly. Almost too quickly. At first I thought something strange was happening inside that tent, but then I noticed people exiting from the other end with big grins on their faces as if, somehow, a burden had been lifted from their souls.

  “All right, Picard. Let’s play it your way.”

  “Good. Let’s queue up.”

  “Q up?” I said. “Up where?”

  “To the queue.”

  “What Q?”

  “That queue, Q,” Picard said impatiently. “The line, Q. The queue line.”

  “If there’s a line for Q’s, let’s stand on that one, instead.”

  Looking at me frostily, Picard said, “Stand . . . right . . . here.” So we did.

  Thankfully, the line began to move quickly.

  When we entered the tent, it was dank and smelly; certainly no worse than any other aroma we’d encountered thus far, and better than some. There was a small room in the center where each person went for a private audience, the room fronted and backed by a curtain. Now that I had a chance to observe people more closely, I couldn’t help but note the remarkable change that overcame them. They would enter the curtained area looking worried and ill at ease, but when they exited, they did so with a jaunty step and a total lack of concern. It was most intriguing.

  It was our turn next and Picard whispered, “Well, Q . . . it appears that we’re about to meet the man behind the curtain.”

  “Step right up!” a voice came from within.

  We entered, and there was the single most shriveled Ferengi I had ever seen. He was cloaked in a large, elaborate robe that seemed five sizes too big on him. His lips were drawn back in the customary Ferengi sneer. He wasn’t looking at us. Instead, he was sorting through a sizable pile of valuables that were to his left, which was only slightly smaller than the other sizable pile of valuables to his right. Now when I say “valuables” I use the word advisedly. Looking at his “treasures,” I was reminded of the adage that one person’s gold is another person’s garbage. Gold-pressed latinum, diamonds, rubies, sand, hardened dung, pictures of Elvis, twigs, dried spittle . . . it didn’t matter. If you thought it was valuab
le, he wanted it.

  “Is there any form of payment you don’t take?” I asked.

  “Credit chips,” he replied. “And out-of-galaxy two-party checks. Otherwise I’m wide”—he looked up at us, and then specifically at me, and finished—“open.”

  And then he let out a horrific shriek.

  He tried to get up and run away, but that only resulted in his chair toppling backward with him in it. “Don’t hurt me!” he bleated. “Don’t hurt me, Q!”

  I stared at this pathetic, twitching creature on the floor in front of me. “Now that’s respect,” I said to Picard. “It’s good to see it from time to time. Learn from him, Picard.”

  Picard shrugged.

  I turned back to the Ferengi. “Have we met?” I asked.

  “No! But . . . but Quark . . . he circulated a picture of you to all Ferengi after you appeared at Deep Space 9! He said you were the most dangerous being in the entire cosmos!”

  His whining was becoming quite grating, but I rather enjoyed his terror. “Ah, flattery,” I sighed. “You’d be amazed how far that gets you.”

  He was now on his knees begging. It was a sight to see. “Look . . . I’m sure we can work something out . . . you can take half my earnings . . . no . . . no, take all of them . . . in fact, you can have the whole business . . . just don’t kill me with one of your thoughts. Quark said you could—”

  “He cannot,” Data said. “He has no power here. Not to any significant degree.”

  “Data!!!” I whispered between clenched teeth. “Keep your mouth shut!”

  The Ferengi stopped trembling and looked wide-eyed at Data. “He doesn’t? You don’t?”

  I glared at Data. “Thanks a lot.”

  Just like that, the little troll stopped quaking. As he dusted himself off and righted the chair, he said, “So . . . what business do you have before the grand nagus! Do you seek a dispensation?”

  “The grand nagus.” Picard looked a bit surprised and said to me, “The grand nagus is the head of the—”