Genie dropped to a crouch, pressed her hands to the floor, and closed her eyes. The bridge and everyone on it stabilized. Mariner realized that the bridge had and everyone on it –including T'Lyn and her hairdo—had resumed their normal appearances, and that the senior staff—Freeman, Ransom, T'Ana, Shaxs, and Billups—were present and alive and well. Purple Tindi—Vision—had disappeared, and Barnes was at the Ops station in her ops uniform and with her trill spots. Boimler crossed to the Con console and took a seat.
"Mom!" Mariner couldn't help herself. She ran to her mom and convulsively pulled her into a hug.
Rutherford crossed to the ops station. "Barnes! You ok? You still you?"
"Yeah, I think," Barnes said. "What happened?"
"I can tell you that later after this is over. Want to meet in the bar off shift?"
Barnes mulled it over. Then she smiled and said, "All right."
Meanwhile, Freeman returned Mariner's hug and patted her daughter's back. "It's ok, sweetie." She gently pushed Mariner away. "Now we have to get some answers." Mother and daughter disengaged. Freeman turned to Genie. "Now, young lady, you have to explain yourself."
"Yeah," Mariner said, "before your jaw has been wired shut."
"*Mariner!*" Freeman said.
Mariner took a step back but glared at Genie.
Freeman said, "For starters, who are you, really? What race are you?"
"I…there's no point in explaining, Captain," Genie said. "Suffice it to say we are to the Q continuum what the Q continuum is to you, and that's dumbing it down a lot. But what you really want to know is what's been happening."
Freeman nodded.
Genie spent a moment gathering herself. "Well…you all know about the Talos solar system, right?"
Mariner said, "Yeah, the one place we can't go, or we get executed by Starfleet."
"Well," Genie said, "after Captain Pike went there the first time, my father and I were studying the system. We found a small temporal anomaly on the edge of the star system. It wasn't really worth noticing. If you passed through it, you wouldn't notice anything major. You're having lunch and you forget if you already had seconds for dessert, that sort of thing. But it still had some fascinating resonances. My father kept poking at it and he…broke it."
Mariner said, "What do you mean, 'broke it'?"
"I mean he broke it," Genie said. "There's no other way to describe it that you would understand. He broke it, ruptured it, and made a hole. He created a bridge to the 20th and 21st centuries of another universe. There, everything you know as reality is perceived as a media franchise. And that created a feedback loop which created multiple timelines."
Boimler said, "How many? Two? Three? Dozens?"
Rutherford said, "Hundreds? Thousands?"
Boimler said, "Hundreds of thousands?"
Genie said, "My father and I stopped counting at 1,771,561."
Rutherford frowned. "Why is that number familiar?"
"And that's just this universe," Genie said. "If you count the mirror universe, that means there are at least 3,543,122 timelines. But then both universes have what my dad and I called Kelvin timelines—don't ask, major spoilers—and that brings the total for prime and mirror universes to 7,086,244 timelines. And then if you factor in-"
Freeman said, "We get it, we get it. Is that what we've been experiencing? Time after…it got broke?"
"Yes and no, Captain," Genie said. "My father was able to…manage the situation. He couldn't fix it, but he could tamp it down. So, ok, imagine a river, that's calm and peaceful for most of its length, then there are these rapids and then it quiets down again. So, in your universe, there's absolutely no difference between the timelines up until...roughly…1964 or 1966 on Earth's Gregorian calendar, and things settle down again after 2368…ish…and even then, the only differences are the appearances of technology and personages in the 23d century, and some historical dates."
Mariner said, "What historical dates?"
"The biggest one is the date of the Eugenics Wars," Genie said. "That keeps jumping around."
Mariner said, "No it doesn't! Everyone knows that's-" She broke off. "Crap, now I can't remember. I used to have that on the tip of my tongue."
Genie said, "You see?"
T'Lyn said, "It is both illogical and absurd that so many timelines would be differentiated by such trivial differences."
"I know, I know," Genie said, "it's ridiculous, and you can make yourself crazy trying to keep track of what's part of which timeline. You people would be better off not even thinking about it. From your perspective, you'll be fine if you think there's just one. Actually, two, but…well, anyway, I was helping my father…" She smiled at Mariner. "…and I saw you, Beckett. I saw what a free spirit you are, how you chafe at restrictions. I could relate to that. That's why I came here, with my father's blessing. I wanted to be with you. And it's been the best time of my life."
Mariner smiled. "Aw, that's sweet. It's been great for me, too. Now, can you get to the part where everything becomes a cubistic nightmare?"
"It fell apart…Mariner, it fell apart because my father died, and I didn't go home to take his place."
"Oh, so, what, Genie, you thought you would hump me while the universe burned?"
"You don't get it, Mariner! I would have to leave forever; I could never be part of this reality again-"
"You put yourself ahead of everything else?" Mariner said. "That was selfish of you."
"I know, but nothing happened at first," Genie said. "And I started to think nothing ever would. I thought there was enough causal inertia to keep things going indefinitely. And maybe it would have if there were only one or two timelines. But there are far too many timelines. The 'rapids' have been getting worse, the discontinuity is starting to spread farther into the future and the past. And some laws of physics, like the mechanisms of faster than light travel, are up for grabs. Sooner or later a 'flood' will come. Everything, your whole reality, will be swept away. It will never have existed-"
Barnes interrupted, "Captain, I'm having trouble getting star fixes for navigation…" The view on the main screen changed to a starfield. And one by one, the stars were winking out. "The stars…this can't be, the stars are going out."
Ransom said, "How can that be? Light years measure both distance and the amount of time it takes light to get here. So if a star blew up tomorrow, we wouldn't see if for years."
T'Lyn said, "Under normal circumstances, yes. But the time disruption could mean that the stars are being destroyed in the past. Or they were never formed. Or the laws of physics, including universal constants like the speed of light, have been compromised. Or reality is being revised in front of us."
Genie pointed at T'Lyn.
Freeman said, "Ok, so what do we do about it?"
"I have to get back to the Talos system and take my father's place," Genie said. She pressed two fingers to her forehead. "And right now…I let things go too long. I have to do this the hard way and use your ship."
Boimler said, "We're on the far side of the Alpha Quadrant from Talos. We would never get there in time."
"I can get us there in a matter of seconds. Please, Captain. I swear your ship and crew will survive the trip."
Freeman looked at Genie for a long moment, then nodded.
Genie went up the ramp to the engineering station and began entering commands.
Billups looked over her shoulder. "Captain, the intermix formula she's entering-"
"Will work this one time, Billups. Trust me." Genie went back down the ramp to the Con station and tapped Boimler on the shoulder. "I have to take the helm, Brad."
Boimler looked at Freeman and Marriner. Freeman nodded. Boimler got up from the chair.
Genie sat at the station and entered commands. The starfield wheeled around as the *Cerritos* pointed itself in the right direction.
Genie said, "Engaging warp drive…now!"
The floor jerked under everyone, and the ship rattled as it raced down a corridor of gas and stars. Then the starfield returned to normal.
Barnes studied her console. "Captain, I don't know how, but we're in the Talos solar system, 1.2 billion kilometers from the star and 25 degrees off the plane of the system's ecliptic."
As Genie yielded the Con seat to Boimler, Billups reported, "Checking systems. Everything normal except…Captain, the transporters and replicators have all shut down."
"Malfunction?" Freeman asked.
"It's not that, captain. We no longer know what the wave function of the universe is. Without that, disassembling and assembling or reassembling matter is impossible."
Boimler reported, "Helm is answering, captain. We're on course to rendezvous with…something. 1200 kilometers and closing."
"Put it on the screen, Mr. Boimler."
What appeared on the screen appeared to be a blue-tinted globe with a mountain floating in it.
Barnes said, "I'm reading an oxygen nitrogen atmosphere, Captain. Gravity 1.001g."
Genie pointed. "Home…or home away from home."
Freeman said, "Jack?"
Ransom rose from his chair. "Mariner, you're going to want see this through to the end, aren't you?"
"Yup."
"Figured. Shax, T'Lyn, Genie, with us."
When they got to the turbolift, Boimler called, "Mariner!"
"Boims?"
"Just come back."
Mariner smiled. "Planning on it."
8
8
Ransom piloted the shuttle craft *Valdez Rocks* to a landing on a plateau only a few dozen feet below the mountain's peak. The Cerritos floated several hundred meters above them. Their landing site overlooked the starfield, the Talos star glowing the brightest. They let the stern ramp down and Ransom, Mariner, T'Lyn, Genie, and Shaxs came out of the ship.
Genie pointed to a black obelisk near the ship. "My father's grave."
Mariner said, "If it was just you and your dad here, and you didn't come home when he died, who buried him?"
"Mike just didn't want to deal with a corpse," Genie said.
"Who the hell is 'Mike'?"
"MikeJaffa. I told you, feedback loop. It can get pretty meta around here sometimes."
"What does that even mean? I'm sorry, but-"
Ransom interrupted, "Excuse me, ladies, much as I love to throw down about the nature of reality, I think we should hurry up. We just ran out of stars." He pointed.
All the stars had vanished except for Talos.
Mariner managed, "Oh, my god."
The space around them turned blue as the Talos star faded and vanished. Then the *Cerritos* began to dissolve into polyhedrons.
Mariner tabbed her communicator. "MOM!"
Static came over the com line: "Sweetie," Freeman's voice broke through, "don't worr…do y..r…" The line went dead as the *Cerritos* broke apart and vanished. The shuttle, T'Lyn, Shaxs and Ransom also broke into polyhedrons and vanished. Mariner turned to Genie as her own body started to dissolve.
Genie grabbed Mariner's hands. "I've got you." Mariner's body solidified. Genie released her.
Mariner said, "Ok, can you bring the others back?"
"Yes, after I take my father's place."
"Ok, then let's go."
They linked hands and ran 20 meters up a winding tree-lined path to a point just below the final, conical peak. A huge square platform was carved into the peak.
Mariner said, "Is that it?"
"That's it."
"How do we get up there? It looks pretty steep."
"We don't climb." Genie's wings twitched.
"Ok, I guess you're carrying me?"
"Beckett, it's not that simple. When I take my father's place, this mountain will leave your universe and become something completely uninhabitable to your kind. You'll have to leave. I'll never see you again."
"That would be it, wouldn't it, Genie? But if that's the way it has to be-"
"No."
"What?"
"I can't do it, Beckett. I won't do it. I was all ready to, but now I can't. I'm not going to give you up, even if it means the end of the universe."
