Captain's Table 02_ Dujonian's Hoard - Michael Jan Friedman [59]
On the viewscreen, the nature of the phenomenon changed. After all, we were no longer attempting to peer into Hel’s Gate, speculating on what it could possibly represent. Now, for better or worse, we were fully and irrevocably inside it.
What had earlier seemed like an flawless center of brilliance now showed us its true colors more specifically, striations of midnight blue and neon green and rich umber, running lengthwise along the inside of a colorless cylinder. And it all seemed to tremble with uncertainty, as if it might take on another appearance at any second.
Despite a bruise on the side of her face, Abby smiled. It was a welcome sight, to say the least.
“We’re in,” she said, collapsing in the Romulan commander’s chair.
“So we are,” I added.
Our vessel had lost momentum, of course, in the process of entering the Gate. But as I checked my instruments, I realized we were no longer doing so. Clearly, this was a frictionless vacuum, though it was nothing like any vacuum I had ever seen.
Abby turned to Worf. “Status?”
The Klingon checked his monitors. “Shields down to fifteen percent,” he reported. “Some of our internal sensor nodes are off-line, but otherwise the ship is functional.”
The captain nodded. “Excellent.”
“How much longer before we emerge on the other side?” I asked.
Abby shrugged. “My brother didn’t say.”
As it turned out, our stay in the cylinder lasted only another thirty seconds or so. Then we saw a bright light at its end, similar to the one we had seen at its beginning, and we began to experience turbulence again.
Considerable turbulence.
“Brace yourselves!” I shouted.
It didn’t help.
As badly as we’d been tossed about on the way in, we were treated even worse on the way out. Clutching my console for dear life, I was wrenched this way and that, feeling like little more than a rag doll.
Finally, the deck bucked and dipped and spun me loose, sending me crashing into the base of someone else’s console. Nor can I say what took place immediately after that, as I wasn’t conscious to witness it.
Madigoor
“BUT YOU GOT through,” said Flenarrh, “didn’t you?”
“Of course he did,” Bo’tex laughed derisively. “What kind of story would it be if he hadn’t?”
“A rather pointless one,” Dravvin agreed. “And I don’t think our guest would tell a pointless story.” He regarded Picard with a glint of irony in his eyes. “Would you, Captain?”
Picard smiled. “Not if I could help it, no.”
The gecko tilted its head.
So did Robinson. “Then you did make it to the other side.”
Picard nodded. “I did indeed.”
“And what did you find there?” asked Flenarrh.
Picard recalled the moment of his awakening on the far side of the Gate. “I found another part of space,” he replied. “Or perhaps another universe altogether. I can’t tell you for certain. All I can say is that the constellations I saw were unfamiliar.”
“And the Hoard?” Flenarrh prodded.
Dravvin rolled his protuberant eyes. “For the sake of Canarra, he’ll get to it. Be patient, will you?”
Picard couldn’t help but chuckle at Flenarrh’s eagerness. “Indeed, at the moment when I woke from my battering, I wasn’t thinking of the Hoard. I was thinking of Dacrophus and his pirates, who were rather conspicuous by their absence. We and our warbird were coasting through the void all alone.”
“They hadn’t followed you in?” Bo’tex asked.
“Or had they followed and been torn apart?” Robinson inquired.
Picard shook his head. “To this day, I don’t know.”
“But they were gone,” the Captain of the Kalliope established.
“They were,” Picard agreed.
“And good riddance,” Bo’tex chimed in. “Lazy lungwarts. Why don’t they go out and get themselves real jobs?”
“Mind you,” said Picard, “I was not pleased at the prospect of the pirates having lost their lives. To my knowledge, they hadn’t committed any serious crimes and even if they had, I’m not certain anyone deserves to perish that way. In any