Myriad Universes 02_ Echoes and Refractions - Keith R. A. DeCandido [153]
“The message is encrypted according to Starfleet protocols,” Sito answered, “but the source of the transmission has been hidden. It could be spoofed.” She paused, and Picard fancied that he could almost hear her smile. “I can crack it open, if you like, sir, and see what’s in it.”
“That won’t be necessary, Lieutenant,” Picard answered, smiling. At times he wasn’t quite sure what possessed him to promote two strong-willed Bajoran women to his senior staff, but he never regretted the decision. Both of them had more than proved their worth these past few years. “Pipe it down to sickbay, if you please.”
“Aye, Captain.”
A moment later, the viewscreen on the far wall blinked to life. The header information indicated that the transmission was a one-way broadcast, in essence a recording. As the message spooled up and decrypted, a Starfleet emblem filling the screen, Picard shouldered back into his uniform jacket, his right arm slightly numbed by the hypo, and went nearer to the wall.
Then the Starfleet emblem winked out, replaced by a very familiar face. Gold-irised eyes looked out from a face with the same yellowish hue shared by all early-generation Soong-type androids, before the techniques to make bioplast look and feel just like human skin were perfected.
The features were the same as those of nearly all those early Soong-types, modeled after their creator, the late Noonien Soong. Picard had never met the man, but couldn’t help but imagine that this was an idealized self-image of the scientist at a younger age. Based on the holos he’d seen of Soong, bent with age, skin wrinkled, and hands gnarled, Picard found it difficult to accept that the scientist had ever been that young, smooth-featured, and tall.
This could have been any one of hundreds of early-generation androids, one of thousands even. But at first glance, Picard knew that it wasn’t. There was only one android this could be.
“Data?” he said in a voice so low it was scarcely above a whisper.
“Hello, Captain Picard,” the image on the screen said, almost as if in response. “It has been some time. And now I need your help. Only you can avert a war.”
Not just any android, no. This was Data, the first successful positronic android, champion of android rights, and onetime member of the Enterprise’s crew. Data, whom no one on board, Picard included, had seen in years.
A short while later, the senior staff gathered in the conference lounge. Without much in the way of preamble, Picard had Lieutenant Sito replay the message in its entirety. The captain glanced around the room, watching the others as they took it in. Some of them, like First Officer Geordi La Forge and Chief Engineer Wesley Crusher, hadn’t just served with Data in those early years on board the EnterpriseD, but had become quite close with him, one might almost say friends. Flight Controller Sam Lavelle, like Lieutenant Sito, had joined the crew after Data’s departure, but still was well familiar with the android’s reputation. And Chief Science Officer A. Isaac, who never knew Data in person, obviously had complex feelings about Data’s reputation and status.
When the recording ended, Picard toggled the viewscreen to a still image of the golden-skinned android, captured from the transmission. Then he turned to face the others, elbows on the table, fingers steepled.
“Comments?”
“It is Data,” Ro said, answering the question on everyone’s mind. “At least, that’s our best guess. The Enterprise’s computers have positively identified the android in the transmission, using everything from voice print to retinal scan.” Ro had joined the crew long after Data’s departure, not long after the Klingon Civil War, when the House of Duras overthrew the High Council with the aid of the Romulan Star Empire. Those had been uncertain times, and Picard had been glad to have the capable young Bajoran in his crew. Later, when Worf had left the ship