"You've no idea how relieved I am that you're here, Mr Riker."
And you have no idea how surprised I am that you're here, thought Riker, pasting a helpful smile across his face and inwardly wanting to wring the man's neck. If he's even a man…
Behind them, taking scans of the surrounding area were Lieutenant Commander Data and Lieutenant (j.g.) Sutak. The sun was shining brightly in the hazy pink sky, and even Sutak shielded his eyes as he strolled across the strip of grass outside the habitat area. In accordance with Picard's suggestion, all three were wearing civilian clothes, as would befit a trading ship's crew.
"But surely," Riker had argued, as they stood in Sickbay prior to beaming down, having the transponders injected, "if I'm going down there, they'll remember my face from my first trip. What's the point in disguising ourselves?"
Picard had given him an enigmatic look: Data, pale fingers engaged in fastening a brown jacket around himself, had caught that look and seemed to absorb its meaning. Riker rubbed his beard uncomfortably as the hypo hissed against his arm.
"Sophistication, Number One," Picard had said. "The test of a sophisticated man is how he picks up on the nuances."
All of which is about as useful as a Pakled at a grammar festival, thought Riker, trying to maintain sociable eye contact with Mayor Stewart while keeping tabs on Data, who was pacing just at the edge of his peripheral vision.
Geordi hadn't been entirely happy about Data's assignment to the party. It had taken a combination of the android's own assurances that he was quite recovered enough to go and indeed wanted to, and the captain's almost supernaturally calm conviction that there would be no danger to mollify him.
And there's absolutely no evidence that this man recognises me at all. Evidently we have a lack of nuances.
He shook off the attack of déjà vu. "Well, we'll do our best to get your equipment fixed up, Mr Mayor," he said, jovially, and recalling Picard's "script", added: "But I guess we'll need to beam down a few more of our crew to get the work done effectively."
"Ah, yes. Of course. And how many are your crew?"
Am I imagining it? Riker thought. Or is he looking a little more interested than before?
He hesitated a beat, watching the man's eyes. Were they showing anything other than honest human interest? "There's about eighty of us," he said. "Most of us are pretty clued up on basic colony equipment. We're from a colony ourselves."
"How wonderful," said Stewart, and Riker felt that as quickly as his interest had piqued, it was gone again. He took a moment to glance at Data, who had come to an abrupt halt a few feet from one of the habitat units and was apparently staring fixedly at a group of colonists stirring a communal stew pot. The android's shoulders were set in a way that somehow set alarm bells ringing in Riker's mind. He was utterly immobile in a way organic folk could never be, and Riker suddenly recalled the description Data had given of the attacking earth and rock. It was totally at odds with the sunny, peaceful clearing around them.
What the hell is he seeing over there?
"Are you all right, Mr Riker?"
Riker blinked. Suddenly everything seemed sinister, as if the bodies of the three dead officers were lying there on the cheerfully pink-lit grass, bleeding out over everything and tainting it.
"You seem upset."
Mayor Stewart radiated polite concern. Riker treated him to a reprise of his good ol' boy grin.
"Just thinking about my cargo," he said. "Some of it has a limited lifespan, shall we say. It'll be ruined if we don't fix you up and get underway soon."
The mayor chuckled. "Your friends don't seem to share your concerns." He indicated Sutak with a wave. The lieutenant had his back to them, his sleek black head bowed over his tricorder. Data remained still as a statue, half-turned toward the habitat. It hit Riker then: he had chosen as an Away Team who were as close to emotionless as was possible - an android and a Vulcan.
Did I do that subconsciously? Choose a team who could not share my own trepidation?
The mayor had clasped his hands before him and was regarding Data jovially.
"Especially that man," he said. "He seems quite relaxed."
"Well, speaking strictly between us, Mr Mayor," Riker lied, the big sociable smile never leaving his face, "he's not too bright."
Data did not know his intellect was being impugned behind his back by his commanding officer: but even should he have done it would not have held his interest. What he was seeing certainly differed a great deal both from the whirling sandstorm and the rural serenity of Anchorage colony. He held his tricorder out before him almost like a weapon, on constant scan.
The air around him was still choked with dust, but it was more of a fog than a maelstrom, and there were continual sluggish movements all around in the half-hidden landscape. If he adjusted the focus in his eyes, or consulted some of the more comprehensive readings from the handheld, he could tell there were large natural geological formations in the distance - mountains, valleys, perhaps even a still-flowing river. The scan results were oddly garbled, as if Hitchcock's gravity was fluctuating randomly, and the magnetic poles of the planet seemed to be skipping about like playful kittens.
Data, who was not in possession of the sort of mind that was given to kitten analogies, merely thought that it looked rather similar to the symptoms of a planet close to core collapse.
"Mr Sutak," he said. The Vulcan looked up, and covered the few yards between them with long strides of his rangy legs. "Please allow me to compare readings on the geological and magnetic spectra with you."
Sutak tabbed a control and transmitted his own readings to Data's tricorder. "I have noted nothing unusual, sir."
Data looked at him with a trace of a frown. Golden eyes met solemn brown ones: Sutak was his usual, imperturbable self, and met his superior's look without reaction.
"Nothing unusual at all?"
"No, sir. Nothing."
Had Data been human, he would at this point have probably succumbed to self-doubt. But the concrete evidence was there in front of him, and indeed all around him. Sutak's readings were just as garbled as his own, but the Vulcan simply could not see them.
Androids, like tricorders, are difficult to fool. Data nodded, dismissing Sutak along with any idea that the technology was misleading him, and noted that his own tricorder had just started telling him quite assertively that there was something directly behind him that he ought to be looking at.
He turned around, pacing a few steps forward.
And froze in place like a statue, unaware of Riker's eyes on him from that distance away.
"Please hurry back," the mayor was saying as Riker, suddenly consumed with a need to know what the hell was going on over there with the second officer, tried to extricate himself without causing suspicion. Data's suddenly intent appearance had unnerved him, and he just wanted to get the hell out of Dodge before anything else happened. Whatever it is, I bet I can't see it. I could be surrounded by the things that murdered Ailforth and M'Reva and I'd never even know it.
It was maddening - he was standing in the middle of a minefield covered in bright, blousy flowers that concealed the horror beneath their petals.
"Don't worry," he forced himself to say, "when we've gathered all the data we need, we'll be back with appropriate personnel."
"Thankyou. Thankyou so very much for your kindness." The mayor wrung Riker's hand once more, then headed off toward one of the ruined hydroponics domes.
Riker strolled over to Data's side with affected nonchalance, and murmured:
"Feeling all right, Mr Data?"
No small part of his concern had been that Data's misbehaving main power feed might have given up entirely and incapacitated the android. But Data turned his head to look at him, said thoughtfully:
"I believe I understand…"