Hard Crash - Christie Golden [16]
At last, it was done. Geordi turned to regard Bart, who felt exhausted and emotionally drained after viewing the information.
"The captain needs to see this. Heck, I think everyone needs to see this." Geordi's voice was heavy and somber.
Bart blinked rapidly and swallowed hard. "It's pretty awful. How much of it do you want to show them?"
"All of it."
Lense regarded the still form of the solitary Bynar. She didn't want to do this, but Gold had insisted. 110 had had the most direct contact with the computer system of that ship. He had information that had been downloaded into that buffer of his. He knew things the rest of them didn't, things that Gold needed to know.
She sighed. "Em, bring him around."
Emmett pressed a hypospray to the Bynar's neck. It hissed gently, and 110 opened his eyes. Lense squeezed his newly healed hand gently and smiled down at him.
"Welcome back, 110," she said softly. "How do you feel?"
He blinked, slowly. "As well as can be expected."
With the tenderness Lense had come to expect from the surprisingly sensitive hologram, Em leaned forward and eased the Bynar up into a sitting position. 110 blinked, seeming a little dizzy, but otherwise he appeared to be fully recovered.
"We--I must speak to Captain Gold," he told Gomez.
"And he wants to speak to you. Let me run a few tests first, to make sure that--"
"You do not understand," insisted 110. He turned his dark eyes to her. "The vessel is alive. It is in pain. And it is very, very angry."
110's shocking announcement stunned everyone except Bart and Geordi, who exchanged glances.
"Before we act on the information 110 has given us," said La Forge, "I highly recommend we watch this first."
"Time is speeding by, Lieutenant," said Gold. "I've got the Enterprise and the Lexington on their way here even as I'm having this pleasant conversation with you."
"I understand the situation, sir," Geordi continued, speaking urgently, "but trust me, you all need to see this first. And I mean see it, not just have me brief you on it."
Gold's brown eyes narrowed and he regarded La Forge intently. Geordi didn't flinch from that scrutiny. Duffy wondered what the hell was on that recording that would make La Forge buck Gold so openly on this.
Finally Gold nodded, cursorily. "You waste my time, La Forge, and I'll let Picard know about it."
"Understood, sir, but I'm certain you won't consider your time wasted."
"Well, then, start the thing going. I feel my hair turning gray."
Geordi pressed the control button, and took a seat.
With such a dramatic lead-in, everyone assembled leaned forward, expecting to see something staggering. The static and snow stabilized, formed itself into the face of a young woman. While Duffy intellectually knew it was the face of the greatly decayed corpse now being held in stasis in sickbay--their possible Borg--this lively, animated visage bore little resemblance to the still death mask of the decaying body they had found in the chair.
By human standards, guessed her to be between sixteen and nineteen, if she was even that old. She was grinning. The recording device, which she held in her hands, was not steady and she occasionally moved out of the center, but this inefficiency, which Duffy would have thought not tolerated by a Borg, seemed not to trouble her one bit.
"I'm recording these on a portable device because I don't want Friend to know about them," she said. Her eyes were a beautiful shade of leafy green, her teeth white and straight. But what broke Duffy's heart more than anything was the smattering of greenish freckles on h er small nose. Judging by Abramowitz's expression, Carol, too, was mourning the loss of such a vibrant young woman.
"Don't get