All Good Things__ - Michael Jan Friedman [19]
He had pretty much concluded that his spells of disorientation and the strangers who had appeared on the shuttledeck were all part of some larger problem. He just couldn’t imagine what it could be.
Unexpectedly, there was a sound of chimes. The door, thought the captain. But who would be calling on him? “Come,” he said.
As the doors opened, they revealed a round, blue-skinned Bolian in civilian garb. The Bolian smiled, perhaps a little too graciously.
“My name is Mot,” he announced. “I will be one of your barbers.”
Picard stared at him. There had been no barbers on the Stargazer. There simply hadn’t been room for them. But on the Enterprise, it seemed, with its considerable population, there was room for almost everything.
Including raggedy wraiths who taunted him from the catwalk. “Pleased to meet you, Mot,” said the captain.
In point of fact, he much preferred to be alone right now. There was too much to sort out, and he had a feeling it was important to do it sooner rather than later.
“Pleased to meet you, sir,” replied the Bolian. “Of course, I would rather be speaking to you as you sat in my chair, particularly as I can see that you’re in need of some attention… but like your quarters, the barbershop is not yet fully equipped.”
Picard nodded in what he hoped looked like sympathy. ‘Trc, sure that problem will be rectified at the earliest opportunity,” he remarked. “The outfitting of your shop, I mean.”
“I hope so,” Mot went on. “-You see, a barbershop is a most essential facility on a vessel of this size. It is a place where ideas are exchanged… where consensuses are reached… where the social fabric is woven and rewoven. And, of course, where hair is cut with the utmost delicacy and artfulness.”
The captain had a feeling that this conversation would go on for hours, if he wasn’t careful. Perhaps days.
“I see what you mean,” he said. ‘TII tell you what. As soon as we’ve finished our visit, I’ll speak with the officer in charge of your deck—and he or she will see to it that the barbershop becomes a top priority.”
The Bolian looked delighted. “How kind of you,” he remarked. “I hope I will have an opportunity to repay your kindness.” He looked at Picard with a critical eye. “In fact, I could go and get my instruments right now. I normally don’t make appointments in quarters, but for someone like yourself… whose last barber was obviously lacking in technique…”
“No,” said the captain, a bit too quickly. “That will not be necessary… really.”
Mot seemed not to have taken offense. “I understand. You wish to wait until I can accommodate you in the shop. You prefer to participate in the complete experience, to bask in the glow of tradition.”
“Yes,” Picard responded, becoming a little exasperated. “That’s it. That’s it exactly. Now, if you don’t mind, I—”
“I might have known you’d be a purist,” observed the Bolian, “coming from a long line of vintners as you do. Well, you’ll be glad to know that barbering has been in my family for generations… almost as long as winemaking has been in yours.”
Something flashed through the captain’s mind, though he couldn’t quite catch it. “How… how do you know so much about my background?” he asked. He was legitimately curious.
“I’m a barber,” Mot said proudly—as if that explained it all. “And as I was saying, I come by it honestly. As you Picards toiled in your Terran vineyards, we honed our shears in our shops on Bol. In fact…”
The captain was no longer listening. At the moment when Mot mentioned the Picard family vineyards, that same something had flashed through his mind again. But this time, it lingered as a dreamlike image.
Of a misty sunrise. Of a vine that needed tying. And of a visit from an old friend, with eyes that weren’t quite right.
But in the dream—if it was a dream—the captain’s hands were old and stiff and difficult to work with. And his mind wasn’t quite as sharp. And his visitor was…
ú.. was Geordi. He remembered now