by Diane Duane
“Paris Opera,” Worf said to him as the overture began, “June 1896. Apparently there was another resurgence of anti-Masonic feeling.”
“Oh, dear,” Picard said. “Poor Mozart.”
The overture finished. The opera began, with Geordi running across the stage in his uniform from the other ship, synching with the voice of the tenor singing Tamino, the hero of the opera, something along the lines of “It’s after me, it’s after me!” He was promptly pursued across the stage by the required Monster, a creature that looked suspiciously like numerous of the staff from engineering operating a hastily cobbled together Chinese “street dragon” made of used blankets from sickbay and a painted waste container for the head. “Tamino” swooned convincingly at the sight of this apparition and fell over. The Three Ladies appeared in the form of Lieutenants Hessan, Renner, and Egli, stunned the Monster with phasers, and began “singing” charmingly about the beautiful daughter of the Queen of the Night, and how Tamino really ought to get together with her.
The boxes continued to fill up. Picard glanced around him and saw mostly bridge crew, but Lieutenant Barclay was here, too, being feted by his coworkers in the computer department, and Dr. Crusher was sitting off to one side, laughing herself weak at both the audience and the crew. Shortly Commander Hwiii came floating in, carrying a tray in his manipulators, and paused by Picard, smiling. Picard smelled caviar and chuckled.
“Commander,” Hwiii said, looking down, “is that the lady you were mentioning to me? ‘Asti Spumante, the Queen of the Night’?”
“Close,” Riker said. “Astrafiammante. My, doesn’t she look good?”
In fact, it was Troi, her hair built up into an astonishing structure diademed with replicated diamonds the size of robin’s eggs, and the Queen’s flowing ebony robes glittered like night itself. In the spotlights, Troi dazzled. She began to sing, or rather to appear to, and the annoyed Queen’s furious and melodious complaint about her “kidnapped” daughter stretched itself out on the air like harpstrings of fire. The audience fought on.
“Ah, sweet Concord,” Picard said softly.
“It’s not,” Hwiii said, handing Picard a champagne flute. “The grape is a gewürztraminer. A very nice sehr trocsken, actually.”
Picard took the glass and smiled. “I didn’t know you drank wine.”
“I do,” Hwiii said genially, “when Mr. Worf hasn’t stolen my straw.”
“I would not have thought that the counselor would have opted for the part of the Queen,” Data said. “She is, after all, more or less the villainess of the piece.”
“Better watch out, Commander,” Geordi, up briefly from the “stage” for a snort of champagne, said to Riker. “She may be getting a taste for that kind of thing.” He grinned. “You should have seen her over there. Grr!” The sound was approving. Riker gave him an amused sidelong look and went on watching Troi.
The madness continued for a long while, people dodging in and out of the performance, by plan and improvisationally, but staying true to the score if not to the costuming or characterization. And the voices rang out sweetly over everything, reinforcing the triumph of structure and love over chaos and hate. A noble theme, Picard thought, and one he was glad to hear more of, after the past day or so. There had been times, in that dark place, when he had had his doubts.
The farrago went on very late. Picard actually didn’t realize how tired he was until he abruptly found himself looking at Riker and Worf down on that stage, both still in black tie and in the middle of a glittering, chorusing nineteenth-century company, “singing” frantically—something about “their hats.” I nodded off, he thought. And in the middle of Die Fledermaus. Not a good sign.
Looking around the almost-empty box, he saw the glitter of eyes resting on him from a distance through the dimness. Slightly unnerved, he got up and went out of the back of the box, out into the bright hallway, and toward the holodeck door. It opened for him, and Picard went through and just stood there a moment in plain corridor light, dimmed, but exactly as it should be.
“I was wondering when you were going to call it a night,” Beverly’s voice said from behind him.
He nodded, crooked his arm to her. It seemed only right, she standing there as she was in astonishing nineteenth-century splendor, jewels at her throat, all in a rustle of blue silk. They walked down the hall toward the turbolift.
“I was thinking of that other Worf,” he said; he had been for a good while before he dropped off. “All alone on that ship… probably the only decent one there. Or what we would call decent. Though—I don’t know—others seemed to have their moments, too.”
“‘The gods,’” Beverly said, “‘have two jars: from one they take good, from the other evil, and so make men: some have more of one than of the other: of such are human kind.’”
“I didn’t know you’d read that translation,” Picard said.
Beverly nodded. They went on in silence for a little way, down to the ’lift doors. It stopped for them.
“But I think of him,” Picard said as the doors shut. “Deck twelve. I think of him there and wonder. Will what happened really make a difference to him? Can it? We were there such a short time. Hard enough to make a difference even in this universe, even over many years.” He shook his head. “Can a word or two spoken really change the world?”
The ’lift stopped. “I don’t know,” Beverly said, looking affectionately at him. “Engage seems to do a pretty good job.”
She kissed him on the cheek, raised her eyebrows at him, and went out.
Jean-Luc Picard looked after her, and the turbolift doors shut on his smile.