Enigma - Michael Jan Friedman [74]
Ulelo seemed to understand what was being asked of him. “All right.”
Here we go, Picard thought. “As you know, we have run some medical tests on you. Through those tests, we have determined with a high degree of confidence that—despite appearances to the contrary—you are not one of us.”
The patient’s eyes screwed up as if he were in pain. “What do you mean not one of you?”
“You are not even human,” said the captain, as gently as possible. “You are a member of a species that calls itself D’prayl.”
Ulelo shook his head from side to side. “No…”
“It is true,” Picard insisted. “And your people have given us what they say is proof—in the form of a code word, which is supposed to enable you to remember who you are.”
“No!” the patient snapped, scrambling backward on his bed like a crab. “I don’t want to remember anything. I’m Dikembe Ulelo. I’m a com officer.”
“Then in all likelihood, their code word will not affect you,” the captain said. “And it will not matter if you are exposed to it.”
Ulelo’s gaze was uncertain, fearful. “It won’t hurt me?”
“No,” said Picard. “I do not believe so.”
The com officer still seemed uncertain. “I want to talk to Emily Bender,” he said.
It was too reasonable a request to deny. The captain nodded. “All right, if that is what you want. I will ask her to join us.”
Bender entered sickbay a little tentatively, joining Captain Picard. But then, she wasn’t entirely comfortable with what he was asking her to do.
Picard didn’t know for certain that the word he uttered would break down Ulelo’s mental block. He had made that clear. He was depending on the sincerity of the aliens—the same people who had been crippling Starfleet ships.
Doctor Greyhorse had found some scars behind Ulelo’s ears. But they didn’t prove anything, really—only that the aliens had operated on Ulelo, back when they were preparing him for his mission.
For all Bender knew, the aliens’ word would destroy what was left of her friend’s mind—and keep Starfleet from knowing what the invaders were really after. Or maybe it would trigger some other response, which would render Ulelo even more dangerous to his colleagues.
But there was also that other possibility, the one in which the captain seemed to believe—that if Ulelo was an alien, they would be doing him a disservice by not saying the word.
What should I do? Bender asked herself as she approached her friend, Captain Picard, and Doctor Greyhorse. What would I want Ulelo to do if it were me sitting on that biobed?
“Emily Bender,” said her friend as she stopped in front of him.
She smiled. “It’s me, all right. How are you?”
Ulelo glanced at Picard. “A little disturbed by what the captain has told me.”
“I’m not surprised,” Bender said. “I’d be disturbed too.”
Her friend looked into her eyes, seeking wisdom there. “What should I do?”
She smiled. “Honestly, I don’t know.”
Ulelo looked disappointed. But the captain’s expression didn’t change. Possibily, he knew she wasn’t done speaking.
“But,” said Bender, “I can tell you what I would do, if I’d been having the problems you’ve been having. I’d take a chance that the aliens are telling the truth.”
Her friend winced. “But what if they’re right? What if I really am one of them?”
That’s what he was afraid of! Not the possibility that the aliens were going to trash his mind, or turn him into a weapon of some kind, but the chance that he would be exposed as an alien himself.
And the more Bender thought about it, the more she understood. To lose one’s identity was to die, in a sense. And like anyone else, Ulelo didn’t want to die.
“Then you need this,” she said, “or you’ll never be free.”
Her friend looked at her for a moment, weighing what she had said. Then he turned to Picard and said, in a voice quivering with trepidation, “All right.”
Picard had been instructed by Ben Zoma to administer the aural trigger in a controlled setting. The aliens had recommended low light, quiet, and that no one else be present except Ulelo and the person uttering the word.