Enigma - Michael Jan Friedman [72]
And Sesballa would see it the same way—the captain was certain of it. At any moment, the Rigelian would give the order to fire. This is it, Picard thought.
“Captain…” said Gerda, her normally assured tone riddled with uncertainty.
His curiosity piqued, he moved in the direction of her console. “What is it?”
Gerda muttered something to herself, her face caught in the glare of her monitor. Then she turned to him and said, “There’s something coming out of her, sir.”
“Something…?” the captain echoed.
Gerda pored over her instruments. “It doesn’t appear to be a weapon. Or a probe.” She turned to Picard again, looking more confused than he had ever seen her. “It reads as something…organic.”
“Magnify,” he said.
A moment later, the image jumped a level of magnitude. But he still couldn’t make out what he was looking at.
“Again,” he said.
This time, the captain saw it clearly. It was a ribbon of something, long and flat and thin. And there were markings on it, too small for him to make out.
“One more time,” he told Gerda.
The image leaped at Picard again, looking close enough now for him to see what was written on the ribbon—and what he saw was shocking in its familiarity. A brief series of characters—two letters from the Standard alphabet, followed by a punctuation mark and a couple of Arabic numerals.
CP ’32.
What’s more, he knew what it meant. CP stood for Chateau Picard. It was printed on every bottle that came from the vineyard where the captain had grown up.
And ’32? That was last year’s vintage—the best the vineyard had ever produced, if the reports from his mother were accurate. But, beside Picard himself, only one other individual was likely to know that.
That was Ben Zoma, who had heard the captain make reference to the ’32 before he departed with Admiral McAteer. Obviously, Picard’s friend had a hand in this.
But in what regard? Was he actually ensconced somehow in the alien ship? And if that were the case, how in heaven’s name had he managed to get there?
Then there was the most important question of all, the one that clenched the muscles in the captain’s stomach and made the sweat stand out in beads on his forehead: What the devil was he supposed to do now?
I know what I am not supposed to do, he decided, and that is to allow this battle to take place. If Gilaad is telling me anything, it is that.
“Mister Paxton,” he said, “get me Captain Sesballa.”
“Actually,” said the com officer, “Captain Sesballa is trying to contact you, sir.”
“On screen,” said Picard.
A moment later, Sesballa’s silver visage showed up on the forward viewer, the muscles in his face taut with tension. And he wasn’t alone. The viewscreen was split into six equal sections, each one displaying the image of a different captain.
“If anyone knows what that vessel is doing,” said Sesballa, obviously speaking to the lot of them simultaneously, “I would like to know as well.”
“I believe my first officer is on that vessel,” said Picard, before anyone else could respond, “and unless I miss my guess, he is telling us not to fire.”
“The hell we won’t,” growled Shastakovich, his face florid with determination. “That ship isn’t going to get a meter closer without my weapons officer putting a hole in it.”
“Frankly,” said Minshaya, “I am surprised at your naïveté, Picard. How can you be certain this is not a trick?”
“These aliens have gone head-to-head with us at every turn,” said Picard, “and we have yet to win a single skirmish. Why would they feel compelled to resort to subterfuge?”
“Who knows?” said Veracruz, his mustache quirking on one side. “Who knows why they do anything?”
“Why are we even discussing this?” asked Nguyen. “It’s an enemy ship, no matter what’s been thrown out its cargo hatch. It needs to be destroyed.”
Picard frowned. “Even if it hurts our chances of beating back the invaders? Or perhaps not having to fight them at all?”
“Why would you think that?” asked Sesballa.
“The aliens could not have coerced