Requiem - Michael Jan Friedman [78]
Certainly, he couldn’t remain here. Not with the place growing thick with Gorn. The prudent thing to do would be to retreat deeper into the midst of these crags, where he might escape the invaders’ notice.
For a fleeting moment, he thought of the fate that awaited the colonists now—the way they would be dragged from their shelters and individually subjected to the Gorn’s handheld disruptor beams. It made him flush with anger and revulsion.
But it was too late for it to turn out any other way. There was no saving these people, not at this late juncture. There was no going back on his decision to let them die.
Just then, a group of perhaps fifty armed colonists broke from a point in the semicircle, headed for the administration building. The group consisted of men and women, in roughly equal numbers—and it seemed to Picard that Julia was among them, though he couldn’t be certain.
They were going to try to make a stand there. They had no chance of success against the invader’s superior numbers, against his superior weaponry, but they were going to make the attempt nonetheless.
The Gorn were materializing all over now. If the captain was going to escape, he had to do it quickly, before the newcomers realized that there was a human among them. Otherwise, all his efforts to survive would come to nothing.
Let the colonists put up their last-ditch defense, he told himself. It’s what the timestream demands of them. It has nothing to do with you.
Still, he found himself unable to run for it. He hesitated, against all common sense. And turned again toward the colony. And felt his teeth grate as a titanic struggle took place inside him.
He could not leave them, could he? And not as a result of his guilt alone, but because he had become a part of this colony—a victim of this insupportable tragedy as surely as anyone else.
Even though he had spent his entire stay here fighting history, he had been a component of it from the beginning. He saw that now, with startling clarity. And seeing it, he had but one choice.
With all the speed he could muster, he took off in the direction of the administration building.
Chapter Nine
AS BARCLAY WATCHED, Commander Data worked the controls that would fix the captain’s position in time and space. Knowing where to look was a big help, but the job at hand required the utmost precision—and the android hadn’t had much in the way of practice. In fact, when it came to a live transport with this alien equipment, he’d had no practice at all.
Still, with his inhumanly quick reflexes and his ability to compute necessary adjustments on the fly, he was by far their best shot. As long as the various systems remained functional, there was a good chance they would see Captain Picard again in one piece.
Barclay sincerely believed that—until he saw the lights flicker and heard the low hum that had accompanied the last two power surges. All at once, the three humans in the room exchanged glances. If Data noticed, he gave no outward sign of it.
“Damn,” said La Forge. He looked about, obviously using his VISOR to track things that Barclay couldn’t hope to notice. “It’s starting again.”
“I am at a crucial stage in the retrieval procedure,” said the android. He still hadn’t looked up. “If I attempt to siphon off the excess energy as I did before, I will have to begin the process all over again.”
The chief engineer continued to track phantoms across the walls and ceiling. At least, they seemed like phantoms to Barclay. But the fact that he couldn’t see them didn’t mean he couldn’t be hurt by them. No, sir.
Varley had been hurt by them. He had been hurt a lot.
And they were so close to getting Captain Picard back. If only there were a way to activate the confinement beam, boost its output as Data had, and nip the power-acceleration pattern in the bud—without interrupting the android’s work …
Then again, maybe there was.
“Wait,” blurted Barclay.