Progenitor - Michael Jan Friedman [80]
It was then that Simenon’s fingers reached the bottom of his pocket—and felt nothing. Nothing at all.
“Is something wrong?” the Elder asked.
The engineer felt dizzy all of a sudden. Dizzy and weak in the knees. It can’t be, he thought wildly.
“Is something wrong?” the Elder asked a little more insistently.
Simenon swallowed and probed his pocket again. It had to be in there somewhere. Where else could it be? he asked himself, knowing full well that it could have been anywhere.
In the underground waterway. In the crevasse. In the place where they fought off the sanjarra.
Anywhere.
Chapter Twenty-four
JITERICA STUDIED THE MONITOR on the engineering console as she ran yet another diagnostic on the impulse drive. There was still a problem with the driver coil assembly, apparently.
She believed she knew how to fix it. It would take some time, of course, but there was no shortage of that. According to the chronometer in her suit, she still had more than an hour and forty minutes to get the engines ready.
“Ensign Jiterica?” said the captain’s son, who had been standing alongside her since she came down to engineering, watching her every move.
“Yes?” Jiterica responded, though her attention remained fixed on the console.
“What kind of being are you?” the human asked.
“I’m a Nizhrak—a low-density being from a gas giant. You’ve probably never seen one of my people before.”
“You’re right,” he said. “I haven’t.” A pause. “I hope you don’t think I’m being rude but . . .I’m kind of curious about your suit.”
“Curious?” Jiterica echoed.
“About what it does for you.”
“I see,” she said.
She went on to describe how the suit helped her to contain her mass, how it made it possible for her to ambulate throughout a starship, and how it facilitated periodic nourishment. When she was finished, she turned to face him.
“Is that what you wish to know?”
The captain’s son nodded, his brow pinched as he absorbed the information. “That’s exactly what I wished... I mean wanted to know.”
Assured that she had satisfied his curiosity, Jiterica returned to her work. But a moment later, she heard the human speak up again.
“May I ask you another question?”
She gave him permission to do so.
“How does it feel,” he asked, “to be a biological being that has to interface with a mechanical device?”
The ensign considered the question. “To me,” she admitted, “it feels awkward. How does it feel to you?”
The captain’s son looked confused. “What do you mean?”
“You interface with this ship, do you not?”
“Well,” he said, smiling a little, “sure. But not in the same way.”
It seemed to Jiterica that he was about to ask her another question about her interaction with the suit—something along more technological lines, perhaps. But before he could do that, she heard his father’s voice over the ship’s intercom.
“Ensign Jiterica?” the captain said.
“I am here,” she responded.
“We’ve got a problem—or should I say a bigger problem. My sensor officer tells me we’re slipping into the sinkhole faster than before. I hope you’re almost done down there.”
“How much time do we have?” the ensign asked. She didn’t think she would like the answer.
“Twenty minutes,” the captain told her. “Tops.”
Her prediction had been accurate. She didn’t like the answer at all.
Picard didn’t understand.
What in blazes was an insadja’tu? And why did it have such significance to the elder?
He saw Simenon turn to the Gnalish in the white robe. “I can’t find it,” the engineer said, his voice uncharacteristically subdued and full of disappointment. “I must have dropped it somewhere along the way.”
The elder’s brow furrowed above his scaly snout. “Without the insadja’tu, there can be no consummation.” He turned to Kasaelak, who was holding his head as he began to regain consciousness. “If the Aklaash has retained his insadja’tu, he may be declared the victor.”
Picard frowned. That hardly seemed like an equitable conclusion.
“Kasaelek,” said one of his comrades. The Aklaash