Metamorphosis - Jean Lorrah [21]
Data laid his burden down on a flat rock, and began drawing in air again himself, for his system had automatically turned off its oxygen-gathering mechanism when he plunged into a potentially corrosive atmosphere. But it was the woman he was concerned abhad she breathed in enough poison to damage her lungs?
The swamp creature loosed its hold on the woman, and allowed Data to pull its twining arms off her without further resistance. It was shriveling in an atmosphere that was poisonous to it, even as he flung it back toward the swamp … and saw it bounce off the barrier and onto the rocks. One part of Data’s mind realized that he had just gone through that barrier and back again hmfbut he had no time to contemplate the impossible 58 when he had a life to save. The woman had stopped breathing, but his android hearing told him her heart still beat. Quickly, he pressed the poisonous gases from her lungs, being careful not to lean hard enough to do her harm. Then he began the process of breathing air into her lungs. Maintaining the rhythm, he tapped his combadge. There was no sound from it, not even the normal chitter of opening the frequency.
He remembered that his phaser would not work, and after the next breath picked up his tricorder to analyze the woman’s condition. That instrument, too, was inoperative.
Data’s own instrumentation seemed to be operating as well as ever-or was there some distortion that caused him to see the woman take a breath on her own, then another, and normal coloration returning to her complexion far too rapidly for what she had been through?
Then she opened her eyes.
“Oh, that I am so blessed as to look upon one of the gods themselves! Have I offended thee? Forgive, please forgive, for the sake of my people,” she pleaded, trying to sit up.
“Do not try to move,” Data told her. “I am not one of your gods. I am-was he fell back on the away team cover story, “coma traveler like yourself, seeking the gods here on the sacred island.”
It was the truth, after all. The woman broke into a smile. “Then it is as was foretold! You are the One from Afar who will join me in my Quest. I did not understand at first. You are very different from my people.”
She sat up, and tried to stand, despite Data’s protests. As she seemed fully recovered, as well as determined, he helped lift her to her feet.
Standing, she took in his appearance from head to toe.
His uniform was still wet-and only now did it occur to him how much danger he had placed himself in to rescue her. He could not swim, and while he could walk under water that went over his head, he could do so only if the bottom were solid ground. If Data stepped into a patch of quicksand, he would sink as fast as a human.
But, as he had not been harmed, there was no use being concerned about it now. It was simply fortunate that he had been available to rescue the young woman. His current problem, with his combadge out of order, was how to contact the Enterprise. They might beam him up at any moment, once they realized he was out of contact … unless, of course, the Elysian gods prevented it. Considering the way they played with that undetectable forcefield, they were undoubtedly the reason his equipment would not function.
Perhaps, then, the Enterprise would be unable to detect him at all, much less beam him up.
Meanwhile, the woman was saying, “You are the One from Afar the gods promised would await me here.
All is fulfilled, then-we will quest together.”
Data remembered the way Drahanna’s words had guided the away team to what the Elysian “gods” expected of them before. Perhaps because they had followed those instructions in good faith there had been no protest then, or when they beamed down to this sacred island. were these more instructions? Did the gods want Data to undergo their testing?