IV
Onboard the Enterprise, the skeleton crew has managed to stabilize the ship for now, but the clouds on the horizon are getting darker and closer – you can practically watch them churn. The waves are getting choppier, and higher; spray can be seen hitting the view screen until Deanna orders it dark. The most conservative predictions by science officers have the waves reaching the top of the saucer section within less than an hour, increasing the odds of the ship capsizing with each minute beyond that.
Harry Kim's suggestion to jettison extraneous weight has been taking up, and all cargo holds are empty. But with non-essential crew, escape pods, and all but two shuttles gone, there aren't many people left onboard to carry out an operation of sufficient magnitude to make any difference.
What else could they toss if they had the manpower, and with transporters off-line? Barring a few muttered smartass suggestions, about the only thing left are the warpcore or the entire star drive section - but B'Elanna has made it clear that while the saucer section can operate independently in space, it cannot lift off from the water on its own. So even if Q were to return the ship to its functions, the star drive section will be critical to getting it back into orbit.
Deanna feels okay about being in charge, but less good about her options. The last time she was in charge of the ship, she crashed it. For perfectly valid reasons and to good effect, of course, but still … She's often heard Tom's and B'Elanna's jokes about their former XO and his record with Voyager's shuttles, and the last thing she wants is a reputation for destroying Galaxy-class ships.
Her mood is not assisted by the sudden appearance of Q on the bridge, practically rubbing his hands with glee.
"Time's a-ticking," he reminds people with a big smile, his affability fooling no one. "Tic-toc, tic-toc."
Before Deanna can respond, Jorak speaks up, his eyebrow raised like Thor's hammer.
"If your powers are as extensive as you claim, sir, then you should be able to extend the time available to the command team for their explorations. You are also, apparently, quite capable of calming this ocean. I recommend you do so. Your pre-occupation with forcing Captain Riker and Commander Paris to accomplish a task you wish them to complete, within a fixed time limit and under stressful circumstances, is neither logical nor is it likely to meet with success."
Q turns around and takes the tactical officer's measure. He doesn't bother raising his eyebrows, just looks Jorak up and down as if he were a particularly unremarkable crawling insect.
"Of course," he drawls. "You're a Vulcan. How typical. How utterly cliché. You people have never quite grasped the concept of fun, have you?"
Q turns back, making it absolutely clear that Jorak has used up his 0.0035 nanoseconds of privileged attention, and flashes another insouciant grin at Deanna.
"Besides, people like your Will and Kathy's Helmboy work much better under pressure. How often have they escaped this corrosive nebula or that imploding anomaly just before it closed up on them, or managed to defeat some alien menace just before the self-destruct countdown hits zero? Let's face it, they get off on this. I'm doing them a favour."
He leers a little. Actually, more than a little. His lower lip quivers a bit as a pink tongue, slightly longer than in your average human, runs across it.
"And you, too. You and Q's favourite little Klingon lady, well, you always get to reap the benefits afterwards, don't you? All that adrenaline left over, and no place to put it but …"
Deanna secretly suspects he's right, but this is one conversation she is not having on the bridge, and certainly not with Q. Besides, they haven't won yet, and things don't really look all that good right now. She gives him a black-eyed glare, and asks the obvious question.
"And just how are you going to find out whether they have any answers for you, if we can't reach them down there, and you have no eyes into the ocean?"
Q studies his fingernails again – a habit he seems to have developed during the time he vexed Kathryn Janeway in the Delta Quadrant, Troi suspects – but this time he gives a little smirk as he looks up, eyebrows raised in surprise.
"You sent down one of your little boats, didn't you? I'm fairly certain that something or someone will pop up to report, and help out. Life preservers, perhaps?"
He chuckles at a joke only he understands.
Troi has had enough. She puts her hands on her hips and channels her mother.
"So if you aren't interested in making this little … charade of yours a bit more workable and less life-threatening, you megalomaniacal little jerk, why exactly are you here? Just to gloat? Haven't you got anything better to do?"
Q's latest smile is pitched somewhere between supercilious and nonchalant, but fails at both.
"Temper, temper, counselor. I saw that little cloud of escape pods and thought I'd check in, see how things are going. But obviously there's nothing to report yet. I'll be getting on then. Just call me when you want to chat. Ta-ta!"
As the air on the bridge collapses in on itself in the precise spot where Q was standing until a moment ago, Deanna Troi clenches her hands into a fist and says something very unlady-like.
But then it hits her, and her eyes narrow in calculation. She can't read him very well – he has defensive shielding that her mind cannot penetrate unless he wishes it to – but his words and body language (however human-based for now, it's what she's got to work with) tell a story of their own.
And this is what it says: For an omnipotent being, Q really does have rather limited access to this planet. It seems to really bother him, like it did Will the one evening he had four separate flushes but could ever quite land the Royal one. And somehow, for Q fear of water doesn't quite seem explanation enough.
She strums her fingers on the side of the Captain's chair as she refuses to consider just how the powers of whatever can stymie a Q might be affecting the Enterprise's command team.
…..
When Tom opens his eyes, the first thing he sees is Riker, looming over him, concern evident in his eyes.
"Feel any better?" the Captain bubbles.
Tom gives the question the careful consideration it deserves and takes inventory, starting with his head, which seems to be clearing, and his gills, which are functioning again. A roll call of his senses finds his mouth full of something bitter, like a piece of gooey moss. Medicine of some kind? He spits it out, having determined that it must have done its thing, whatever it was, and how on Earth Riker knew which piece of kelp wouldn't kill him. Eventually, his stock-taking reaches his feet, only to register a curious tickling sensation.
He looks down to see a small swarm of brightly coloured tiny fish, all rather purposefully nibbling at the bottom of his flippers. His instincts scream at him to pull back and kick them away, but the feeling is actually not unpleasant - in stark contrast to what the spiky thing did to him originally. More importantly, the residual pain he feels is steadily receding under the creatures' ministrations, almost as if they are erasing all evidence of his recent experience. One satisfied customer makes off with what looks like one of the barbs that are embedded in his flesh; another quickly takes his place.
Tom decides it's probably in his best interest to let them carry on for now, and casts a what-the-hell-happened-here-exactly look at Riker. The latter points silently to his left, with an usually soft smile that barely shows his impressive canines. Whatever is there, the Captain is clearly not afraid of it – quite the contrary.
But Tom cannot possibly be prepared for what he sees, not at all, and his mouth falls open in wonder.
A shape, obviously humanoid, floats up to him, palms turned up in silent greeting. The green glow given off by the mossy walls is reflected in a pair of enormous unblinking eyes of similar colour. A cloud of dark blue hair undulates around the woman's form like a soft, floating corona.
A woman.
The creature is clearly female, based on the pair of beautifully shaped – and unselfconsciously uncovered - breasts that under any other circumstances would have utterly captivated and derailed Tom's mind. Her skin is pale turquoise, almost translucent; blue lips are curled in a small smile. Her feet … no, wait - there are no feet. The graceful shape tapers into what looks like a long tail, covered in shimmering scales that range in colour from palest opalescent silver to darkest sapphire at the finely finned tail.
She opens her mouth and Tom's mind fills with the song he thought he had only imagined – lilting and beautiful, soothing, a little sad.
He nods wordlessly and smiles, understanding both her welcome and her sorrow at his pain, and holds perfectly still as her long and graceful fingers start to run lightly over his face, his hair, his shoulders, lingering a little over his Starfleet issue singlet. This deep down and away from the light, eyesight is clearly not enough and he knows he owes her this tactile exploration. He gets a little nervous for a moment when her hands slide lower, but she seems far more interested in the miracle of his legs than she is in … other parts.
When Riker emits a little snort at his XO's evident discomfort, Tom frowns a grim warning. He's heard a number of the Captain's own conquest stories by now, over a few too many Romulan ales, ranging from Fun With Andorians And Other Multi- or Non-Sexed Aliens, to (Pssst!) Getting It On With Crusher Using The Alien Possession Excuse, and he is absolutely not above using any or all of them for blackmail. If there is one story B'Elanna Torres will never hear, it's the one about The Time Tom Paris Got Felt Up By A Mermaid (Wearing His Wedding Ring).
Riker gets the message quickly, sobers up, and straightens his features back into Serious Captain mode.
"It must have been her I saw moving in that building," he blubs, all matter-of-fact now. "She came as soon as you got in trouble. Practically knocked me aside – that tail of hers packs quite a punch."
Of course she would come. Mermaids help stranded sailors, don't they?
Children's tales, children's miracles, children's dreams. Tom shakes his head, his father's voice ringing in his ears: Don't be ridiculous, Thomas. There's no such thing as mermaids.
He shakes his head again to get the voice out of his head – but there are, Dad, there must be! - and looks up into the creature's emerald eyes. He is struck by their gentleness, their depth, their earnest curiosity.
He smiles, and his utter delight in the encounter shines out of his eyes and into hers. He looks over to Riker, and his Captain's smile tells him he hears the song too, even as he seems content to let Tom have the lead in the encounter for now.
"Thank you for saving my life," Tom says simply, trying to convey, somehow, the wonder and gratitude he feels. He wishes he could sing back to her but he knows he can't. So instead, he reaches for her hand – slowly, so as not to spook her - and softly caresses her fingers, to say with his touch and his eyes what he cannot express in a language she would understand.
He is gratified to see her smile in return. She lifts his hand close to her face and examines it closely, squeezing his nails and spreading his fingers, marveling at the lack of webbing between them. Again and again she dips her finger into the gap between his fingers, her song becoming an excited twitter.
"I guess you don't get many alien visitors down here, do you?" he says, trying to put a smile into his voice – and into his thoughts, in case she can read them. Absurdly, the words we come in peace cross his mind, and the classic images of first contact.
With a smile, he tries to send her the basics, hopes she can hear his thoughts:
We're from far away. Glad to meet you. Yours is a beautiful world. Different from mine, but not unfamiliar.
He tries to think his name at her but realize that probably won't work (how do you think 'Tom'?) What he is certainly isn't fit to be turned into song, and any images of himself that he could send her won't give her anything to call him beyond partly reconstructed failure. So he relies on the tried and true method of pointing at his chest and saying "Tom" a few times, watching the silvery spheres drift up towards the surface.
She looks at him – the same way Miral would at a particularly cute furry animal – but then she repeats his gesture and sings into his mind. Obviously, if this is the way you communicate on a daily basis it's a lot easier to think your name, and he knows beyond certainty that hers is "Alarra." He repeats it back, first in his thoughts and then wrapped into bubbles; her answering smile is a flash of pearls.
But then, just like that, Alarra lets go of his hand. She touches his singlet again and then raises her fingers to her mouth, suppressing what looks for all in the world like a giggle. Her tail starts waving up and down excitedly (like a mammal's, Tom registers vaguely, not side-to-side like that of a fish) and she darts off towards the broken spire. She moves with both grace and speed, that powerful tail driving her on, and the dark waters remove her quickly from their sight.
"What'd you do? Scare her off?" Riker asks when they are alone.
"Starfleet issue underwear usually has that effect," Tom replies. The he sobers a little.
"I tried to tell her 'thank you', and that we were visitors. I had a feeling she understood me, and I'm pretty sure she told me her name. Alarra. I don't know, Will, what's it like when Deanna talks to you, and you to her?"
Will knows what he means by 'talk' – telepathic or empathic communication - and shrugs.
"I hear her, but it's not words. Feel her, inside of me. And she always gets what I try to let her know or feel. It's hard to describe. But we always know when the other understands."
Tom nods to himself. Yes, you just know. Alarra – the truth is in his understanding.
But with his unexpected saviour gone, they really need to focus on their task, whatever it is. Will looks at his tricorder. An hour has passed, at least; in this timeless underwater world, it might as well have been an eternity. Up top, they suspect, the seas have started to churn.
"Now what?" Tom asks. He's fresh out of ideas as to what to look for, and where. Having your brain addled by poison and then filled with a childhood (and fine, somewhat adolescent) fantasy will do that to a man, he figures, so he doesn't exactly feel apologetic about it.
"Did you get anything from that altar thing you were looking at before I almost got killed, Captain?"
Riker shakes his head in the negative.
"Q likes to study people, races. But if that altar was ever anything more than a hunk of stone, it isn't anymore. And if there's anything here that even remotely looked like the technology of an advanced civilization, it's long since been overgrown by corals."
That was a long sentence for underwater talking, and Tom is impressed at how much Riker's technique has improved. But the observation the Captain just made doesn't exactly help them, does it. Tom touches the wall – keeping a wary eye on the sand at the bottom, lest the camouflaged spiky thing has family close by – and runs his fingers along the stone. There are no seams.
The Captain continues his briefing. Clearly, once he had assured himself that their surprise rescuer was only interested in Tom's survival and not his nutritional properties, he let her go about it and continued looking for that enigmatic something that might make Q return their ship. Without, it appears, much success.
"Another thing I haven't seen, though, is any indication that this place once used to be above water. Everything looks like it belongs here."
Of course. The Captain is right. It's so easy to assume that living aboveground is everyone's normal, that there had to have been some catastrophe to bring this place underwater.
No. This crumbling town, this ancient fortress – they're not the drowned remnants of something that's lost to another world. They are what they are, their own being, their own truth. And so he looks much more closely, beyond the easy assumptions of his world's architectural vernacular (a temple, a fortress, a gate) to their essence.
"Yeah, you're right. These walls – they're not built, see? They've been grown, like those hedges in Normandy, only a lot more durable. Here, look, you can see it. Corals, used to trap sand and shells. Trained to grow in a certain way, in certain shapes."
Tom realizes he is starting to babble with excitement and slows down, forces himself to contain the mixture of awe and wonder he feels as he looks around the decaying underwater city. This is the sea, its heart and its soul, a home and a refuge.
"It must have taken eons to build …." He corrects himself quickly. "No, to create all this."
Riker swims over. He's getting better at that, too, Tom notices – a natural athlete and a quick learner. Tom points out the layers of calcified marine life that make up the wall, and Riker nods his agreement.
"And a few more eons to let it go. Wonder what it looked like in its heyday, and what happened."
The Captain points at the unruly growths that have taken over the once-neat walls and the crumbling spire. Tom shrugs, and frowns.
"Maybe the makers stopped caring?"
There's a sudden movement in the water – no, that's not quite right. Down this deep there isn't really a current, but perhaps among the marine senses Q bestowed upon them there's one that alerts them to the tiny fluctuations that suggest something big is displacing water. And its doing it towards where they are.
Whatever it is they can feel, they turn at the same time, ready for the worst.
Out of the blue depths beyond the broken spire, dark shadows glide towards them at considerable speed. Riker grips Tom's arm; the shapes are still far enough away that perhaps they could make a break for it. But the XO shakes his head almost immediately.
"The tails, Will. Up and down, not sideways. Those aren't fish – they're … her people."
He can't bring himself to say the word, even though he's thought it a few times now and here is perhaps the best – the only - place to use it without sounding ridiculous.
Merpeople.
A few heartbeats later – so quickly that it's pretty obvious they wouldn't have been able to get away even if they'd tried – a whole swarm of humanoid forms surrounds them, and a chorus of song envelops Tom's mind. They are beautiful, there is no doubt about it: fine features dominated by enormous, shining, unblinking eyes; well-defined muscles and smooth skin on both males and females; iridescent tails, in colours ranging from deepest ruby to palest aquamarine, with all jewel tones in between.
Alarra is with them, in the lead, her smile a glow in the darkening light of the ocean floor as she leads her people towards her discovery. She swims up to Tom without hesitation and reaches for his hand, nudging him to demonstrate his un-webbed fingers to a group of her companions, most of them female.
Next she grabs a fistful of his grey singlet, pulls on it a little as if to prove to her friends that it isn't attached to Tom. The melody in his head turns into a peal of silver notes. Do mermaids giggle?
He notices with some relief then that their visitors seem to find something of interest in the Captain, as well. Apparently, facial hair is not common undersea (no doubt it would trap some unwanted flotsam) and for a few merciful moments Riker's beard eclipses everything else there is to see in the two humans.
Surrounded by a swarm of merfolk, feeling their gentle, prodding touches on his skin and their laughter in his mind, he is reminded of the welcome he receives when he steps into the nursery to retrieve Miral. The squeals of delight, the pattering feet, her arms flying around his legs. That innocent quality he noted in the first woman's eyes … well, it's in all of their eyes and suddenly he understands, with a clarity that takes his breath away. He turns to Riker.
"They're children, Captain. Ancient children."
For some reason the paradox of that statement doesn't faze him in the least, and he is relieved to see that it doesn't seem to bother the Captain, either. Riker nods, slowly, deliberately.
They are sentient, these beings of the sea, of that the two officers have doubt, and more than empathic – the song that fills their minds is a crescendo of excitement, welcome and delight. But if the serenity of their eyes and the crumbling state of the world they inhabit are any indication, it has been a long time since any of their kind has lifted a hand to build, to make, or to do.
They don't live to a purpose. They just … are.
And that, as far as Tom is concerned, is enough.
But are they what they came here to find?
A sudden current stirs the weeds at the edges of the building and the sand swirls a little. The rainbow clouds of fish have disappeared, a few stragglers twinkling away and into small crevices in the walls and buildings around them as he watches.
The mood among their hosts changes without warning. Eyes widen, turn fearful – then determined. Tails are beginning to lash and a number of their visitors peel off without ceremony and head towards whatever is to be found past the spire. Alarra tugs on Tom's singlet, motioning him to follow.
Tom turns to Riker, who casts a calculating look upwards. The droplets and beams of sunlight have gone, and the water's ceiling looks as dark as the depths around them.
"The storm is here." The Captain states a fact, not a supposition. "We have to go back up."
Tom nods his assent. If what they found is not what Q wants, so be it. He wasn't very specific in what he was looking for, and whatever they tell him, it will have to do.
Alarra is getting desperate now. She grabs Tom's arm and starts to drag him in the direction of the spire with unmistakable urgency.
"I'm sorry, Alarra." He tries to make her see, points upwards, fills his mind with images of stars, B'Elanna and Miral – a song of a colour so different from hers, but still, with an echo of the sea.
"I have to go back."
She seems to understand, and the look of desolation on her face is heartbreaking. The song in his mind turns into a dirge, with spikes of something that can only be fear, and warning. Clearly, the storms on this world are sufficiently powerful to be felt down here, and she wants him and Riker to take shelter.
All her companions have fled by now, but yet she seems reluctant to leave. A thought strikes Tom then, and with a swift movement he pulls the singlet over his head and gives it to Alarra.
"Here, take this. For your dress-up box, or when you want to freak out your friends."
More somberly, he adds, "Something to remember us by."
Alarra takes the unpretentious gift as if it was an untold fortune, weaving her hands through it before trying to pull it over her head, the way she has seen Tom take it off. She gets stuck in one of the armholes and he has to help her out.
"Looks a lot better on you than it did on me," he says with a smile, even as he senses Riker getting impatient.
"Sorry, got to go."
He fishes for the right kind of salutation, something appropriate; the best thing he can come up with is, "Live long and prosper."
It seems to do, because she flicks her tail and darts off.
"Wonder what we'll find when we get to the top," Riker remarks as they start their ascent out of the bowl, up and up, past the clamshell-lined walls. Already, the waters are starting to pull at them.
"To be honest, I'd rather not think about it," Tom replies. But then he becomes aware of an urgent melody in this mind, three notes almost like a claxon, and he slows down briefly to look back.
Alarra rises out of the depths, waving to them to stop.
Tom's singlet flutters a little on her lithe torso, so much smaller than his, but it doesn't seem to bother her. She is here on a mission, it seems, and obviously in a hurry. Her small hand extends towards him, closed at first, but then her webbed fingers open like a flower or one of the anemones of the deep. The gesture is unmistakable – here, take this.
Cradled in the palm of her pale blue hand is a large, white, shimmering pearl, like the one that almost cost Riker his arm. Tom is rendered momentarily speechless by the gift - certainly, in terms of exchange value, his must now rank as the single most valuable Starfleet tank top in history. But far, far more than that, he is touched by the sincerity and artlessness with which the gift is offered – not an exchange, after all.
A token.
"Remember," her simple song fills his mind, and his heart.
"Remember."
And then she is gone, and Tom scrambles to catch up with his Captain as they head up, into churning, blackening waters.