To Storm Heaven - Esther Friesner [49]
“However, I do not yet have sufficient information to judge whether the purpose of such a presence was strictly academic. The young woman who made this recording speaks of drinking souls, leading others deeper into darkness, and being herself an agent of lies. None of this sounds particularly scientific to me.” “Come with me,” Riker said, heading for the door.
“I want the others to hear all of this.”
Troi and Lelys sat on the edge of their bed staring at the device in Mr. Data’s hand. Riker stood behind the android, leaning against the wall, jaw set, eyes steely.
They had all just heard a ghost talk, bringing them a message from the past that had left them incapable of immediate speech. The stillness in the room was absolute.
Mr. Data calmly closed the little panel on the back of the disc and asked, “Would you like me to play it again?” Troi shook her head. “Not now, thank you.” She still looked stunned by what she had heard. “All those years,” she said, half to herself. “Incredible.” “They are not our kin.” Ambassador Lelys spoke so abruptly, so fiercely, that all eyes snapped onto her.
“They cannot be our kin. What are they, these Ne’elatian creatures who claim to be descended from the blood of S’ka’rys?” She hunched over, her hands in fists on her knees. “I wish we had never learned of their existence!” Mr. Data regarded her inquisitively. “I fail to understand why this recording has provoked such strong reactions. It does not strike me as inflammatory, nor even particularly informative. Any facts it contains are obscured by the young woman’s emotional outbursts.” Riker closed weary eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. The hour was late, but apart from that he felt drained by the events of the night, not least of them the words he had just heard. “What we have here, Mr.
Data, is a multifunctional device that belonged to the woman who the villagers here knew as Stakis but who identifies herself at the end of this message as Isata Kish of Ne’elat.” “That I understand. What I do not see is—” “She didn’t come here as a scientist or an emmissary or even just a curiosity seeker. She came as a spy.
We’ve all heard the same story from different sources, all about how both these worlds came to be settled, how all contact between them was lost, if it ever existed in the first place. What we didn’t know until now was what happened after Ne’elat rediscovered space travel and came back here.” “That is another thing I do not understand,” the android said. “Both worlds were settled at the same time by the same people. Why did Ne’elat enjoy such accelerated technological progress while Ashkaar apparently stood still?” “The answer may lie in the story we heard this evening,” Troi suggested. “Do you remember the part about the Sixth Mother?” “She became a foul-smelling mist that rose up out of the ground and stole the people’s memories,” Riker answered. “Probably a reference to the fumes they must have endured in the more geologically unstable areas.” “Prolonged exposure to the substances contained in certain cthonic emanations can cause extensive brain damage, which in turn could account for widespread memory loss in a given population, among other effects,” Data observed. “That is the best evaluation I can make, given the fact that the sole source of pertinent information is folk tradition rather than scientific record.” “So, a time of darkness,” Lelys reflected. “All the old arts and sciences stolen from their minds as if they had never existed. The Ashkaarians had to remake their world.” Her eyes glittered angrily. “This only makes the sins of Ne’elat all