STAR TREK: TNG - The Genesis Wave, Book Two Read online

  “I can do that,” replied the geologist with a smile. “You stay here and watch your boxes, and I’ll go to the edge.”

  “Not too close,” warned Geordi. “Take a tricorder and don’t get any closer to the edge than ten meters. Will that get you close enough?”

  Dolores sniffed with pride. “I’ll have you know I was regional shot-put champion in college, and I competed in the Martian Olympics, where I finished second.”

  “It’s still dangerous,” said Geordi fretfully.

  “It’s only a rock,” said the geologist. “That’s funny for a rock hound like me. After the Great Flood, Noah sent a dove to see if it was safe. But we’ll have to send a rock.”

  She stretched her grimy legs and surveyed the sticky riverbed. It was populated by frightened, dirty clumps of Bolians, who were as much in shock as any group of survivors could possibly be. With their vacant, hopeless expressions, they looked like the homeless refugees they were.

  “It will probably take me a minute to get there,” added Linton, scraping the mud from the sole of a boot. “We’ll try combadges, but I don’t think they’ll work. Just keep me in sight, and I’ll wave to you if it’s safe.” At his worried look, she smiled and tapped the pouch on her belt. “Don’t worry, Geordi, I’ve got my tricorder.”

  Unexpectedly she kissed him full on the mouth—a kiss that was warm, urgent, and gritty from sand and sweat. Dolores pulled away, grinning, and she was one of the most dashing figures he had ever seen. “Keep dinner warm,” she said playfully. “I’ll be back.”

  Geordi nodded forcefully, unable to think of anything else to say. A moment later, Dolores dashed off, her strong legs churning through the mud, and he hurriedly pulled some field glasses from his toolbox. Placing the lenses to his implants, Geordi watched the strong hiker as she wound her way among the masses of people. Here and there, she offered words of encouragement to the survivors, and she also stopped to pick up and inspect several fist-sized rocks.

  All too soon, Dolores’s distinctive infrared image got muddled with the others, and he lost sight of her. After making a quick inspection of the generators, La Forge went back to watching the riverbed. Although all the land looked wet and new, it was easy to see where the safety net ended and chaos took over. Their circular field was the only land in view that wasn’t erupting with freakish new life. In this muddy riverbed, the old life hung on with dogged tenacity.

  Another check of the equipment showed a twenty percent drop in power since the last check, and La Forge surveyed the perimeter with added urgency. He finally spotted Linton, crouched at the edge of the sand, facing a huge geyser that spewed brackish water eighty meters into the air. He assumed she had to be getting wet from the spray and wind, but she stayed in place, braving the ungodly elements.

  Through his field glasses, La Forge studied the crouched figure as intently as she studied her tricorder. Finally Dolores took a deep breath and squirmed forward on her knees. With a lunge, she hurled the rock straight toward the geyser, and he could finally comprehend her logic. Because the glistening soil around the geyser was the only smooth terrain in sight, except for the riverbed, the rock was still visible. If she had tossed it anywhere else, it would have vanished in the teeming underbrush.

  Although he couldn’t see the rock any longer, he was certain Dolores could. Several tense seconds passed, and Geordi forced his eyes away from the figure on the periphery to check the generators. The primary generator was now down thirty-seven percent, probably because of the damaged gel packs. If they were going to get a reprieve from this calamity, now would be a good time, Geordi thought.

  He heard a cry of joy that pierced through the wind, and he looked up to see Dolores running toward him, waving her hands. “It worked!” she cried. “The rock didn’t change! It’s all over but the shouting.”

  “All over?” mumbled survivors doubtfully. It was clear that misshapen plants and squirming animal life were still growing at an accelerated pace, even if the crust of the planet had stopped its upheaval. It didn’t look as if anything had changed, and La Forge was hesitant to turn off the generators.

  A loud clicking noise sounded, and a humming noise faded out. Geordi hadn’t even noticed the hum until it stopped, and he saw immediately that the primary interphase generator had died. Seconds later, the other generator stopped too, making his decision moot. Geordi tensed, waiting for the Genesis Effect to rip through him, turning his body to sludge. But nothing happened. They had won the battle, and their prize was a chaotic, primitive planet that bore no resemblance to the sophisticated, peaceful world they had known.

  Overcoming his gloom, he ran toward Dolores, and they hugged each other with tearful relief. The moment of joy ended quickly, when he had to ask, “Where’s Admiral Nechayev? Can you take me to her?”

  Dolores nodded her head and grabbed his hand, leading the way. They wandered among the Bolians, who peppered them with questions. Geordi found himself repeating over and over, “It’s safe to leave the riverbed, but be careful out there. Stay in a group.”

  “Is it always going to be this chilly and damp?” asked an elderly Bolian.

  La Forge shrugged. “I don’t know. We’ll have to learn about Myrmidon all over again.”

  A few moments later, they reached a clutch of Bolians and Starfleet officers gathered around a prone figure. The smile erased itself from Geordi’s face when he stepped close enough to get a look at the wounded admiral. Much of Nechayev’s face and left side were badly burned, and she was unconscious, breathing with a labored rasping sound. Only a few tufts of her reddish gray hair were left on her charred skull.

  A Bolian doctor worked steadily on the admiral, but all he had was a first-aid kit. It was clear from the frustrated expression on his face that he wasn’t happy with her progress.

  “How is she?” demanded La Forge.

  The doctor frowned, producing a ripple of double chins under his dour blue face. “If I had a proper medical facility, maybe I could help her. But out here ... I’m afraid she’s dying.”

  “Doctor!” someone else called, yanking on his shoulder. “You’ve got to look at my wife! Please!”

  The doctor shrugged and rose to his feet. “I’m sorry, but I’ve done all I can for the admiral. Now I’ve got to look at the others—”

  “Go ahead,” Dolores answered with sympathy. She knelt beside the fallen officer and picked up a bloody gauze from the sand.

  “All I could do was give her something for the pain,” the doctor added apologetically before he was dragged off.

  With moist eyes, Dolores looked up at Geordi. “If she dies, you’re pretty much in charge of this entire operation.”

  La Forge wanted to say reassuringly that Alynna Nechayev wasn’t going to die, but her gaunt visage gazed up at him, belying those words. He watched helplessly as a light snow fell on the admiral’s charred face and cranberry-hued uniform.

  two

  La Forge stared helplessly at the injured Admiral Nechayev, wanting to protect her from the downy snowfall. All around him in the dry riverbed on Myrmidon, survivors stirred from their traumas and tried to nurse the wounded and frightened. Geordi continued to stare at the admiral, wanting to dab at her burnt and scarred flesh, when he noticed something remarkable. Where the snowflakes fell on burnt skin, there was a foaming reaction. Nechayev was so deeply drugged that she didn’t react, except to breathe a little more deeply.

  “Wait here!” Geordi ordered, jumping to his feet. He dashed through the wet sand to the periphery of their protective field, about a hundred meters from the interphase generators. He could tell they had ceased operating, because the jungle of new growth was starting to encroach ... rapidly. He skirted alongside the vines and bristling greenery, looking for a damp section where the soil was still evolving. Time was running out, because the flora, as bizarre as it was, had already started to stabilize in its new matrix.

  He saw a seething hollow where it was still like a swamp, with fist-sized slugs wr
ithing in the ooze. With a grimace, La Forge dug his hands into the primordial soup and came up with two teeming gobs of it, which he swiftly carried back through the crowds.

  The refugees stumbled away from him, muttering and gasping, but Geordi delivered his precious cargo to the admiral’s side and began smearing it over her burns like a medieval salve. Several Bolians fell back with cries of disgust, but Dolores leaned forward with curiosity.

  “It’s a good thing the doctor left before he saw this,” she remarked. “I’m not sure he’d approve of whatever it is you’re doing.”

  “It’s a last resort,” answered Geordi, “but still worth a try. This material is still mutagenically active at the moment. It’s incredibly fertile, and it promotes new growth. So it ought to promote healing as well.”

  “Can we do without the leeches?” asked Dolores, wrinkling her pert nose. “Or whatever they are.”

  Geordi nodded and brushed off all of the squirming slugs, three of them. They should be worried about what these repulsive creatures were going to grow into, but one step at a time. Right now, he needed to save Admiral Nechayev any way he could.

  “Geordi!” exclaimed Dolores. “Look!” She pointed down at the admiral’s face, where the mutagenic salve was having a dramatic healing effect. Her burnt skin was regenerating with rapid cell growth, no doubt aided by the protomatter in the matrix. Whether there would be disastrous long-term side effects, Geordi didn’t know, but the admiral took an untroubled breath and seemed to fall into a deep sleep.

  “Now I think I’d better get the doctor,” Dolores said, rising to her feet. “He might want to see this ... for other patients.”

  “I’m afraid I got to the last genetically active soil,” La Forge said sadly, glancing at his tricorder. “The mutagenic effects are wearing off. We got to her just in time.”

  “What else do we have to learn about this place?” asked Dolores Linton, gazing at the overgrown jungle of snow flurries and mist which surrounded them. “This could be a whole career, just cataloguing what happened to this poor rock.”

  “You’re not thinking about staying here?” asked Geordi in amazement.

  She shrugged. “Sure, why not? It’s got to be safe. Hasn’t the worst already happened? Besides, aren’t you curious about this planet? This is a whole new world, waiting to be explored.”

  The engineer shook his head wearily. “To tell you the truth, I would just like to get back to my ship. Preferably, in this lifetime.”

  Dolores gave him an impertinent smile. “You’re only here because you were ticked off when Leah Brahms went looking for revenge.”

  La Forge scowled and turned away, unwilling to admit that she was right. “All right, so why are you here?” he demanded.

  “Call me old-fashioned, but in an emergency, I would rather be on the ground than in a spaceship. Besides, you looked like you needed someone to look after you.”

  Geordi couldn’t argue with that either, but they both might live to regret their rashness. He wondered whether Leah would regret her decision, too. It was hard to find much solace in revenge. He couldn’t imagine how Leah and that crazy Klingon, Maltz, were going to track down and defeat the perpetrators of this war all by themselves. They were like Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, tilting at windmills.

  He finally decided that each person had to face the end on his or her own terms. What exactly had he chosen to do by staying behind on Myrmidon? At the time, it had seemed like he was confronting the Genesis Wave head-on. Now it seemed like he was hiding from it.

  “You know,” Dolores said softly, “we’re not leaving this planet unless someone figures out a way to come back and rescue us. It makes sense to plan what we’re going to do, in case we stay. I know the Romulans said they would come back to get us, using cloaking devices, but will they? Everyone out there is going to be really busy with the Genesis Wave ... maybe forever. But here it’s come and gone.”

  “That’s a very practical outlook,” Geordi said, slumping wearily into the damp sand. “I guess I should stop worrying so much about myself. We’re alive, and that’s as much as we could expect.”

  “Besides,” said Dolores, sweeping her hand toward the field of demoralized refugees, “we can’t leave all of them.”

  “Did you ever think that it might not be over?” asked La Forge. “That this is only the beginning?”

  “Of what?” she asked worriedly.

  “Well, someone terraformed this planet for a reason. That means someone plans to come here and use it. Who? And when? Those are the next questions to ask.”

  Dolores nodded gravely and sat down in the sand beside him. She gripped his hand, and wordlessly their gazes drifted to Admiral Nechayev. The injured woman was sleeping peacefully, aided by the drugs of Starfleet and the massive forces that had ripped apart the planet, and were now healing it.

  In the middle of an overgrown hollow that had once been a city, the blue-skinned barber gathered his courage and rose to his feet. Mot and his parents had been sitting near the door of the sanctuary when the conflagration struck, and he had seen most of it through the doorway. He still could not believe even half of what he had witnessed, but he had waited long enough inside this lone building, protected by the interphase generators.

  None of the others would move, but they hadn’t seen the ground stop quaking and the skies stop churning.

  “Come,” he told his aged mother and father, helping them to their feet. “It’s time to go out and see our new world.”

  The jam-packed crowd of tens of thousands, plus children and animals, all hushed at once. Crouched in the darkness, they watched to see what this fool would accomplish when he stepped into the obscene terror outside the door.

  Mot touched a door handle, and it disintegrated, leaving a fine silt on his fingertips. He pushed the creaking door open, and it fell off its hinges, landing in the thick underbrush with a muffled thud. Ferns and evergreenlike plants grew in abundance, unfurling long pistils and colorful red blooms. Misshapen, twisted trees towered above them, casting cold shadows, and the air reeked of ammonia.

  The ground was crawling with wormy and fishy creatures, and Mot forced himself to walk forward. He held his parents tightly, one in each arm, but he had to stop when the brush got too thick and imposing. Mot sneezed as a gust of fog swept through the hollow, and he wished he had a crate of machetes.

  “Is it ... is it really safe?” asked his frightened mother.

  Mot shrugged his beefy shoulders. “Safe or not, it’s all we’ve got.”

  A few hearty survivors followed them out, but they recoiled from the foreboding plant life and squirming slugs. Mot turned and looked back at the golden dome of the sanctuary. It stood amid the chaotic jungle and wispy fog like an alien spaceship that had landed in the wilderness.

  Commander Jagron lifted the fluted glass of Saurian brandy to his thin lips and took a sip. His patrician nose flared slightly as the smoky solvent cleansed his throat. The Romulan officer needed the drink after viewing the logs of the disaster at Myrmidon. Despite the happy face Starfleet wished to paint upon their haphazard operation, the planet had clearly been devastated by the force called Genesis.

  This was supposed to be a victory celebration, hence the brandy. But no sane person could consider the debacle on Myrmidon to be a victory. Those inhabitants fortunate enough to survive were certainly not fortunate now. They had been reduced to pathetic, homeless refugees—a drain on the Federation.

  None of the other commanders in the briefing room on the Terix offered an immediate comment either. They quietly sipped their drinks and considered the sobering facts. After it wiped out Earth and a large chunk of the Federation, the Genesis Wave was going to cut a swath through Romulan space. Many of their colonies would suffer the same fate as Myrmidon, Seran, Hakon, and the other planets that had already perished; and there was nothing that could be done to stop it.

  “We are trying to save these fools, when we should wipe them out for their carelessness,
” muttered Commander Horek of the Livex. There were nods of agreement from the other three commanders of the task force.

  Indignantly, Commander Damarkol added, “How do we tell our people about this? How do we prepare them for such a disaster?”

  “Everyone at home must know by now,” answered Tomalak grimly. It was upon his warbird they were conferring, and he was senior among them, thanks to his considerable experience with the Federation. “We’re the only ones of our people who have seen it firsthand, but a hundred of our finest ships are on their way here.”

  “They come only to watch more worlds die,” grumbled Damarkol, a frown on her leathery face. “Even so, Genesis is an impressive achievement ... if they could only control it. Technology like that needs a firm hand and tighter security.”

  “There has been too much secrecy connected with Genesis already,” declared Commander Jagron. “What we need is cooperation and more information about it.”

  Tomalak looked at his young colleague with a wry smile. “If you think you’ll get the Genesis secret from the Federation, you’re wrong. They lost that knowledge when they lost Dr. Carol Marcus. Even when they had it, they didn’t know what they had.”

  “Are you still going back to Myrmidon to rescue Admiral Nechayev?” asked Jagron.

  His host nodded. “Yes. Despite their bungling, the Federation are still the ones who are most likely to find a solution. The survivors on Myrmidon have really seen the wave firsthand, and may have learned something.”

  “May I offer the D’Arvuk to go in your place?” Commander Jagron suggested, taking a sip of his brandy.

  The elder Romulan blinked with surprise. “Why, that is most kind of you, Commander, considering the risk. But it was my idea, and I feel indebted to carry it out. Sort of a favor for Captain Picard.”