The Devil's Heart - Carmen Carter [110]
“Have you come to order me to my cabin, Doctor?” His words were faintly slurred with fatigue.
“No,” said Crusher, turning in the direction of Picard’s voice. She could barely make out a shadowy form hunched on the sofa. “After all, it doesn’t seem to have done much good last time.”
“Sleep doesn’t refresh me … too many dreams … I was on the verge of a dream when you came in.”
The doctor noted that Picard’s response time was significantly slower than usual, as if he was still working his way back to consciousness.
“I’m sorry I disturbed you.”
“No, don’t apologize,” he said. “I’m not sure I want to dream again.”
As her eyes grew more accustomed to the dark, Crusher could see that the captain was bent over the Heart. For a moment, a trick of the subdued lighting made her think the stone in his hands was glowing, but when she stepped closer the doctor realized its surface was the same dull gray she had seen before. “I’d like to run a few tests on you.”
“What?” Irritation roused Picard out of his lethargy. “Go to sickbay? I haven’t time for that now.”
“I knew you’d say that.” Crusher patted the medical tricorder hanging by her side. “So I came prepared to do a scan right here in your office.”
“Very well,” he said, slumping back over the Heart. “Do as you like.”
Moving quickly, before Picard could change his mind, she pulled the peripheral scanner off the tricorder. After a few passes of the whirring instrument, she had a preliminary result that confirmed the exhaustion she had already observed and also indicated some minor evidence of general neglect. “According to my readings, you’re somewhat anemic and your blood sugar levels are depressed. When was the last time you ate a decent meal?”
But Picard was lost in his own thoughts and didn’t hear her. “If I had understood its powers better, I could have saved the Enterprise without killing the crew of the Plath.”
A flick of Crusher’s thumb abruptly ended the scan; his mental state was of more interest to her after that statement. “Captain, do you really believe the Heart was responsible for the explosion?”
“I’ve tried to find some other explanation, but there is none. I regret …” He shook his head as if to dislodge the memory of the Klingon ship engulfed in flames. “The Heart obeyed my anger rather than my reason, yet over time I could learn how to wield its powers more directly.”
“Learn? How?”
“It speaks to me, Beverly,” whispered Picard, and she knelt down by his side to hear him more clearly. “In dreams I see wonders you can hardly imagine unseen vistas of the cosmos, times long past and yet just within reach. The Heart is as old as the stars and has powers beyond imagining. Why, the destruction of the Plath was mere child’s play. I could—” “Jean-Luc! What if you’re not the one in control?”
“You don’t understand,” he said. “The Heart doesn’t compel action, it merely offers the means to gain one’s ends. With this small stone in my possession, the Enterprise could be proof against all enemies and their betrayals, free to explore the entire universe without danger …
I could never fail.”
“Failure is human,” said Crusher. “We learn from our mistakes.”
“Some mistakes serve no purpose; some defeats only bring pain and humiliation.” He looked into her face, meeting her gaze directly for the first time. “If I were the only one involved, Beverly, perhaps I could accept my mistakes; but the consequences of my actions have affected so many other people. I’ve even hurt you and Wesley, and if it is in my power to make amends …”
“No, don’t torture yourself with those memories.” Crusher laid a hand on his arm, trying to reach through the sorrow that clouded his eyes.
She had made her peace with Jack’s death, but evidently Picard had not. “You can’t change the past, Jean-Luc.”
“But what if I could?” He leaned so close that she could feel his breath on her cheeks; his voice took on a deeper, more ominous tone.
“Given the opportunity for study, I suspect I could learn