Gateways 07_ What Lay Beyond - Diane Carey [125]
After half a minute or so, a small ball of light began to form above the Resonator and one of the amber keys began to blink. The light grew in size and began to alter shape, forming a sphere that swelled to engulf the top of the control panel. Within the sphere, smaller swirls began forming, and Picard realized that it resembled nothing more than a model of the Big Bang theory. As the seconds passed, the stars began twinkling and the image altered slowly as galaxies formed and moved off camera, as it were. Picard felt Chanik at his side, the image too fascinating to ignore.
“Those are the stars, aren’t they?”
“I believe so,” Picard said softly.
“Why are we seeing so many?”
“I don’t know. It may be trying to show us where the people who built this might have gone.”
“Gone?”
“Hush,” Picard said as the image changed and the Milky Way was clearly in his sight. The familiar spiral shape filled the light bubble and then, one at a time, purple lights began to show themselves in a concentration that Picard recognized as the Alpha Quadrant.
In all, there were thirteen purple lights.
Picard stared at the representation and concentrated. The amber light continued to blink, so Picard tentatively reached out, thinking he needed to activate the switch. His fingers brushed the blinking light but a sharp sound was his only reward.
“It didn’t like you touching it,” Chanik said, clearly stating the obvious.
Picard frowned and considered the likely options. After a minute or more, he realized he had no choice. He needed to return with the thirteen keys, then get them to the highlighted gateways. He suspected all thirteen consoles would have blinking lights and that none would do anything useful unless they were all touched at once. Fourteen pieces to a single key and somehow the Iconians didn’t know that.
Somehow, this lack of precision comforted Picard. Even they were not perfect.
Reaching into his pocket, he withdrew the tricorder and recorded the light patterns and the purple markers. The Enterprise computers would be able to match this map against their own star charts and, adjusting for the time difference since these maps were first recorded, figure out where the keys needed to go.
Spinning on his heel, Picard strode to the antechamber, Chanik on his heels. “What’s going on?” he kept asking. The captain ignored him at first, emptying his small bag of dried meat and other odds and ends. He then began filling it with the thirteen Resonators. There was little question in his mind that somehow all fourteen signals would synchronize and somehow they would gain control of the devices once that occurred. What troubled him, though, was the fourteenth key. Someone would need to activate it from this planet.
His first thought was sending the keys through a gateway and including an instruction to Riker and the others. It felt wrong he needed to be there, be home when this happened. If the Resonators simply shut off the gateway, he would be trapped on this world. While it was a pretty place, he had no interest in remaining a Young God for the remainder of his life.
The next idea also had its concerns. Chanik would have to get involved but that raised concerns over tampering with a culture. On the one hand, the Iconians left these people to fend with their remains, and on the other, what harm could there be in asking a boy to press a button?
“Chanik, I must ask a favor of you.”
“Of course, Picard,” the boy said, eyes bright with excitement.
“I need to return to my people with these,” he said, shaking the bulging bag slightly. “All of them must be fit onto similar machines and then all of us must press the blinking button. I think we need to do it at once.”
“How will I know?”
Picard frowned at the basic