Dyson Sphere - Charles R. Pellegrino [39]
“Close, Beverly? We had whole seconds to spare.”
“Captain Picard,” Worf said, “the Dyson Sphere is going from bad to worse. I think we should leave as soon as the Darwin is fit again, while we can do so without great difficulty.”
“You may be right,” Picard said, suddenly gazing past Worf to the islands in the distance, clearly visible with absolutely no fall-off beyond the horizon. This was a feature distinctive of the flattest place in the universe. But he was forced to remind himself that it was only an apparent flatness, born of the widest curved space ever built. Einstein had been forced to struggle with a similar problem while attempting to probe the even more exotic concept of spacetime curvature—meaning, the entire universe: “Most people are confused by curved space,” the physicist had declared, “even those who must live in curved spaces.”
Confusion. This artifact has the power to overwhelm, Picard warned himself. I must be careful.
Confusion …
It seemed that a strange singing sound was coming from the islands, as if something were vibrating just beyond the range of his hearing …
He broke the spell and noticed that Guinan was watching him carefully. She walked down the slanting hull and stood beside him, and he wondered what she was thinking.
He said, “Those islands are only a random sample of what this world has to offer, by way of secrets, and probably the last such sample we’ll ever have.”
“We have time to see them,” Guinan said softly, as if she knew something or someone there. She seemed to be straining to listen.
“I will come along, Captain,” Worf said, and Picard could not help but hear his security officer’s unspoken words: “The captain of the Enterprise should not put himself in danger.” Except that this mission was intended to involve the captain from the start, and there was nothing Worf could do except to be present and protective.
As the Klingon climbed into the cockpit of the Feynman, something on “those islands” beckoned to Picard, like the Sirens of Greek mythology. The still air brought strangeness, and he thought of how death had been prophesied to Odysseus—”It shall come to you out of the sea, death in his gentlest guise.”
“Troi to Picard.”
He touched his communicator. “Picard here.”
“Dr. Crusher is assisting with the injured— mostly concussions,” Troi’s voice continued. “Repairs should be complete in about twelve hours, Captain Dalen estimates.”
“Then we do have time to see the islands,” Picard said. “Maybe we even have time enough to take another stab at the sun—from afar, next try, and maybe—just maybe we can change—”
Guinan put a hand to the side of his face, and something infinitely joyful yet shocking ran through him like lightning through salt water. “You will change nothing,” she whispered, “except your own decided course.”
“What?”
“Nothing lasts forever, Jean-Luc; not our great machines, and least of all us. Time will have its say. It always does.”
“My decided course?” he said.
“Remember, they say time—”
“—Is the fire in which we burn,” he finished for her, and she took her hand away from his face.
“Remember,” she said again. “Remember.”
Picard could not remember when he had seen a sea so calm. Worf, at the controls, skimmed the Feynman like a hypersonic stealth fighter over the island group, making a proud, wide arc at treetop level, then stopping abruptly in midair and climbing.
Viewed from on high, the islands were a chain of circular green patches, floating like waterlilies on a vast pond. The first island was the largest, and it now revealed a startling sight: a circle-within-circles strewn field of broken porcelain tiles, criss-crossed by bridge supports and canals. Picard checked his panel sensors and knew that his ears had been right: A high-pitched sound was rising from the ruins.
“Beautiful,” Guinan said. “Like Plato’s description of lost Atlantis.”
“Do you somehow know this place?” Picard asked, wondering.
“No, Captain,” she said, smiling. “I haven’t been here before.”