When the great stand of Starfleet happened
at Wolf 359, the Chekov wasn't able
to get there in time. I think Captain Korsmo
has convinced himself that, had he been there, he would have
been able to make a difference."
"He's probably right," she admitted. "But
he imagines that he could have had some impact. It
eats at him that he didn't have the chance. And it
eats at him even more that it was, of all people--"
"Jean-Luc Picard who turned the tide.
Are you saying Captain Korsmo is unfit for
command?"
"Not at all. He just has a bit of a blind
spot when it comes to Picard, that's all. We
all have our blind spots. I know one officer, for
example, who has a blind spot when it comes
to realizing the best thing he could do for his career is
move on to captaincy of another vessel and let
someone else take his place."
"Except for that blind spot, he's a superb
officer," said Riker dryly.
"Oh, an exceptional officer.
Absolutely exceptional." She smiled, and
she had a lovely smile. "And not afraid
to make the tough decisions."
Ahead of them, the two captains strode side
by side, neither speaking, until finally Picard
said, "It's good to see you again, Morgan. Once
this business is done, I'll buy you a drink in
Ten-Forward and we'll discuss old times."
"Old times?" Korsmo gave a short
laugh. "I rode you like the devil, Picard. I
helped to make your life miserable. Don't
tell me you're nostalgic for that."
Picard shrugged. "You exaggerate."
"Not in the least. In a way, you have me to thank
for your current success."
Picard looked at him with barely concealed
surprise. "I do?"
"Of course. It was my constant haranguing of you
that drove you to achieve as much as you could."
"What a fascinating way of recalling our
Academy days."
"It's true. I spent so much time reminding you
of your limitations, that you felt driven to try and
surpass them whenever possible."
That, Picard thought, had to be the biggest crock
that he had ever heard. But something warned him that
Korsmo wasn't just needling him. He had the
distinct feeling that Korsmo actually believed it,
and more, that the belief was important to him.
And now was definitely not the time to challenge it.
"My thanks, Morgan," he said simply,
and then quickly changing the subject, said, "What do
you intend to say to the pilot of the planet-killer?"
"Starfleet's position. A position that I
expect you to back me on. I am the senior
officer here, after all, Picard."
"Senior off--"
"I received my commission as captain before you
did," Korsmo said. "Or were you unaware of
that?"
"Two weeks before," said Picard, trying
to keep the derisiveness out of his voice.
"Seniority is seniority, Jean-Luc, and
I'll thank you to remember that."
"I will consider myself officially thanked," said
Picard, and then he suddenly said, "Halt."
The turbolift came to a stop and Picard
turned towards the surprised Korsmo.
"We are dealing with an obsessed woman," he
said, not allowing Korsmo to even open his mouth.
"You seem to be under the impression that we, with our
two starships, are going to intimidate this woman
just by the force of our presence and our words. You had
best think again, Morgan. She has the drive
and the power to do what she wants. We may not be able
to stop her."
"We sure as hell will stop her," said
Korsmo.
"She may not listen to us."
"She will listen if I have to shoot her legs out
from under her. Besides, we've done a scan on her
ship. There's damage to a section of the
neutronium hull. We can hit that if necessary,
possibly damage her."
"I don't want her hurt."
"Now listen, Picard ..."
And Picard stabbed a finger into Korsmo's
face and said, each word a dagger, "I don't
... want ... her ... hurt."
Korsmo stared at Picard in utter confusion.
"Have you lost your mind? What is sh e to you?"
"A victim. A victim many times over, and
I will not see her victimized further. Clear?"
Korsmo seemed ready to laugh, but he saw the
intensity in Picard's face. His expression
tightened and clouded. "I will do what I have to,
Captain," he said. "And I trust that you will do
likewise."
They stared at each other for a long
moment, and then Picard said sharply, "Resume."
The turbolift obediently completed its journey
to the bridge in stony silence.
When Picard and Korsmo entered the conference
room, Deanna Troi and Guinan were waiting for
them. A ship's counselor Korsmo naturally
recognized, but he stared with open curiosity at
Guinan. Picard quickly introduced them.
"May I ask, just out of morbid curiosity,
Captain," said Korsmo, "why you feel it necessary
to have your bartender here?"
"Hostess," corrected Guinan politely.
"I have a ... history with the woman in question."
"May I ask the nature of that history?"
"It's personal."
Korsmo seemed slightly taken aback by that
and turned to Picard to protest this apparent
attitude problem on the part of someone who was,
at best, a crew member of questionable need in these
circumstances. But the firm look in Picard's
face quickly discouraged Korsmo from pursuing the
subject further.
Picard turned to Troi and said, "How is
Miss Bonaventure? I understand that there was some
unpleasantness in engineering."
"She is resting comfortably. Quarters have been
assigned her," said Troi, "to remove her from the
rather tense environment of sickbay."
"Tense?" Korsmo looked at Picard with a
question in his face.
"There are Penzatti recovering from wounds there,
and they react somewhat strongly to Miss
Bonaventure's presence. She is a female
Borg whom we have managed to separate from the
Borg consciousness."
Korsmo scratched at his salt-and-pepper
sideburns. "Never a dull moment on this ship,
is there, Picard? Kind of a zoo."
"I prefer to think of it as a stimulating work
environment," replied Picard. "It would be best
to post a guard outside her quarters--"
"Lieutenant Worf has already attended
to that," Troi told him, and Picard nodded his
approval.
The doors hissed open, admitting Shelby and
Riker. Picard looked at them with faint
disapproval. "Took our time, did we,
Number One?"
"Scenic route, sir."
"I see."
Moments later Geordi La Forge entered as
well. P
icard nodded a silent greeting to him.
Korsmo was circling the briefing room,
looking annoyed. "So where is this woman?
We're all here. Where is she?"
"She'll come," said Guinan.
"Ah. We have the personal assurance of your
hostess that she'll be along," said Korsmo.
"Captain," Picard began dangerously.
But Korsmo continued, "And what is it with this
ship of hers? Is she the only crew? How
does it run?"
"She claims it runs on the hatred of
ghosts," said Picard dourly. "Frustrated spirits
who waited for her to come along and provide them with
drive. However, Mr. La Forge has been
working along far more prosaic lines to determine just
what it is we are up against."
"Our sensors have managed to punch through some of the
interference her fields and hull have created," said
Geordi, and he moved to the main computer screen.
He called up a schematic he had prepared as
he continued, "And Data and I have also done
research into other cultures that have similar
glimmerings of technology of a more--shall we say--
said Delcara told him."
The planet-killer appeared on the screen, and
Geordi tapped the spike-like extensions. "These
are definitely what propel the ship. They warp
space in a manner similar to our own
nacelles, but appear to do so in a slightly
different manner. We're detecting warp
fluctuations on a field pattern at variance with
our own warp system. It'll take us at least a
week to fully analyze the structure, and we
don't have the technology to duplicate it. It
seems to have tremendous potential, though,
especially in its more efficient use of fuel."
"Fuel that comes from planets. Then that's how it
operates and this nonsense about being driven by
souls--" said Korsmo.
"I'm getting to that," said Geordi. "There's
a race on Orin IV that has technological
procedures that sound similar to what Delcara
told the captain exists on her ship, except
it's not lots of hocus-pocus."
"Orin IV was a colony world about fifty
years ago, wasn't it?" asked Picard.
"Good memory, Captain. And the
colonists made a fascinating archaeological
find--an intricate computer net that was still
functional, developed by an ancient race,
speculated to be the Preservers, and then long
ago abandoned. It was crystalline in appearance and
about the size of a small mountain, and what it
contained was an intricate network of individual
memory pockets.
"Presumably, when members of the race died,
they would be capable of imprinting the engrams of their
minds--or perhaps transferring their consciousness
entirely--into the interlocking network within the
crystal. There they would provide knowledge and information that,
to the right operator, was accessible."
"Accessible how?"
"Through a central sort of mother board," said
Geordi. "You see, that was the really tough part.
In a way, it's the main difference between the setup
on Orin IV and my understanding of how the Borg
operate. The Borg are one central
consciousness. The Orin IV mechanism consisted
of hundreds, thousands of individual pocket
memories. Computer files, if you will. But in
order for them to be accessed, they required a
central mind to act as a processing station. That
central mind had to be, first, a living
individual, and second, incredibly strong. The
first time one of the Orin IV colonists, who was a
Betazoid, tried to use his empathic ability
to access the crystal computer they'd found, the minds
stored within the computer literally overwhelmed him and
blew his gray matter inside-out. Finally they
brought a Vulcan in, but by then it was too late.
The failed attempt had wiped the data banks
clean."
"So the people who created the planet-killer," said
Picard slowly, "may have transferred their
collective consciousness to the central data
banks of the vessel. But they needed a powerful enough
living mind to process all of their individual
impulses, to unify them and drive their
individual functions towards one goal."
"They need one central mind strong enough to govern
all of them and direct the ship's functions,"
agreed Geordi. "Otherwise, they're just random
bits of data and information without any purpose.
It's that central, functional imperative that
enables this planet-killer to be something more
complicated than just a mindless killing machine like
its prototype.
"One of the ship's functions that the mind
maintains is the process of consuming planets and
converting them to energy for the ship's drive and weapons
systems. Those spike towers," he pointed again,
"can warp space for the purpose of forward drive,
and also funnel force beams with pinpoint accuracy,
making it capable of omnidirectional offense.
Nasty piece of work."
Korsmo started towards him, about to make some
point, and he walked right through Delcara.
He jumped back in shock as Delcara's
holographic persona turned to face him for a
moment and look at him with amused disdain. Then she
she said. "So much effort to try and take the divine
rightness and wonder of my mission and turn it
into something ordinary. "Mother board" and
"functional imperative." These are not words of
humans who understand what it is to live and breathe and
hate. These are words that the Borg would use.
Beware that the enemy becomes thyself, and that you are not
as blind in intellect as you are in eyes." Then she
turned back to Picard. "I've heard you,
Picard. I am here." She spread her hands.
"What do you wish of me?"
Picard was staring at her, hard. There was something
different about her. She seemed older, somehow.
Some of the luminous quality that had surrounded her was
diminished. Her face appeared longer, more
drawn. Her hair, which had seemed to be
constantly billowing about her, as if puffed up by a
perpetual breeze, was hanging limply. Her
eyes did not sparkle as they had. He glanced
at Guinan and Troi, and they noticed it, too.
He couldn't dwell on it. Nor did he
wish to contemplate Delcara's singleminded
determination to reject every rational answer in favor
of the irrational. There was business to be attended
to. "Delcara," he said formally. "This is
Captain Morgan Korsmo. He and I are
appealing to you now as representatives of
Starfleet."
"Are you, dear Picard?" She seemed
amused, but there was something haggard in
her smile.
"And what is Starfleet's business with me,
Captain Morgan Korsmo?" She walked
towards him and right into the conference table. She stood
there, only the upper half of her body visible,
the lower half obscured by the table, giving the
impression that she was some sort of
bizarre centerpiece. It was a most disconcerting
appearance.
Korsmo cleared his throat and said, "Captain
Picard and I wish to express our concern over
your present course of action."
"You have a problem with my intention to obliterate
the most dangerous enemy in this galaxy?"
Skeptical, she raised an eyebrow.
"It is our concern," Korsmo said, "that your
plan of action will cause devastating results
throughout the Federation. Your vessel consumes
planets. There are various races, both friendly
and unfrly, that will not take kindly to the concept of
your ingesting them or parts of their solar systems."
"I believe the human phrase is, "You
cannot make an omelette without breaking a few
eggs,"" said Delcara.
"This is more than a few eggs, Delcara,"
Picard spoke up. "You're talking about the
greatest destruction our galaxy has known. Far
more destructive than if the Borg swept through."
"Truly, sweet Picard, that was spoken as
someone who has never experienced the full sweep
of a Borg invasion."
"We've had our encounters."
"You've had nothing," she said, her voice
suddenly harsh. "One Borg ship. A ship that
smashed through your fleet and cost thousands of lives
and was stopped as much by fluke as by anything else.
You have no idea what the full might of the Borg
would do to you. It would be far more than my humble
needs."
"Your humble needs will launch the galaxy into war
against you!" said Korsmo. "And Starfleet will lead
that war! You cannot be allowed to traverse the
quadrants in a device of this power--a device
which consumes planets for fuel!"
"A device which will prove your ultimate
salvation," she replied.
"Delcara," Guinan said firmly, "have you
realized the magnitude of what you're proposing?
It will take you years, even at warp speed,
to reach Borg space. And all during those years,
you will be cutting a swath of devastation and
destruction across populated space. Certainly
you can see the insanity of that?"
"Insanity is quibbling over a relative
handful of lives when the Borg care nothing for
life! I will try to avoid populated worlds when