CHAPTER 17

IN THE COMPANY of Dr. Bashir, Jake walked along the corridor of the Utopia personnel dome heading for the planning room, where they were to meet Jadzia and Worf.

The doctor had said little since the mess hall, where Jake had told him about Nog's lie. At least what Jake had suspected was a lie.

For once he had seen Bashir's reaction to what he had described, once he had realized the danger they all faced because of it, Jake had gone over his last conversation with his friend, reconsidering, worried that he might have jumped to an unwarranted conclusion.

“What if he's not lying?” Jake asked Bashir.

The doctor kept walking briskly. “I was waiting for you to say that.”

“No, really,” Jake said as his long legs kept easy pace with Bashir. “What if Nog's changed in the past twenty-five years? What if . . . if I misread the signs?”

“Think of it this way, Jake. There comes a time when each of us has to trust our instincts. And I trust your instincts from a time when you had no idea what the repercussions of your observations would be more than I trust your rather predictable second-guessing of yourself now that you're aware of the danger in which you've placed your friend.”

Jake was intimidated by Bashir. He knew the man was genetically enhanced, like some latter-day Khan Noonien Singh. How could he argue with someone whose brain was the equivalent of a computer?

But he had to.

“Dr. Bashir, I'm not doing this to save Nog.”

Without breaking stride, Bashir shot him an amused smile that let Jake know that was exactly what he was doing.

“Look!” Jake finally said, and for emphasis he stopped dead.

“I'll . . . I'll go tell Nog myself what you're—”

It took a few steps before Bashir realized Jake was no longer beside him. The doctor turned and came back to him, looking irritated. “You will do no such thing!” Bashir hissed. “I know what it's like to lose a friend, Jake. But you have to accept that after twenty-five years you have lost Nog. You don't know what pressures he's been exposed to, what compromises he's had to make, all the little capitulations and loss of ideals that accompany adulthood. The fact is, you don't know Nog anymore. You can't know him.”

Jake felt his face grow hot. “Then why should you accept what I said about his maybe lying to us about the Phoenix's chances?”

“Because that wasn't a conclusion based on friendship,” Bashir said. “It was a straight observation, devoid of emotion.”

“You mean, like I was a Vulcan,” Jake said, depressed at the turn this conversation was taking.

“Say what you will, but Vulcans make the best witnesses. Now—shall we go?”

Jake gave up and then fell into step beside the doctor again. He supposed Bashir had a point, though the guy was awfully cynical about the process of becoming an adult. What sort of compromises would an adult ever have to make? Kids—even nineteen-year-olds—were the ones who were trapped by society and convention. Anyone could tell them what to do, force them to go to school, restrict their entertainment choices, and even, on the frontier where it was used, keep hard currency out of their hands.

But adults, it seemed to Jake, had none of these restrictions. Sure, there might be pressures associated with their jobs, but don't forget those pressures were taken on by choice. That choice, in his opinion, was the key difference between someone his age and someone Bashir's.

As they neared the planning room, Jake took a sidelong look at the doctor's face, trying to remember his real age.

Bashir paused beside the door. “What now?”

The guy has eyes in the side of his head, Jake marvelled. “I was just wondering . . . how old are you anyway?”

Bashir sighed. “By our standards, or in this time?”

“By our standards, of course,” he said. He knew that technically everyone from the Defiant was twenty-five years older than they had been a week ago.

Bashir seemed to hesitate. “How old do you think I am?”

Jake couldn't resist the opportunity the doctor had just given him. “I don't know,” he said with a perfectly straight face. “Fifty?”

Bashir's face twisted into an incredulous look. “Fifty? I'm thirty-four, Jake.”

“I said I didn't know,” Jake said innocently. “You made me guess. I guessed.”

“Fifty . . .” Bashir rolled his eyes skyward, then punched in his code to open the planning-room door. Jake kept his smile to himself.

The security condition light was still red. It didn't change to either amber or green. Then the computer voice said pleasantly, “This facility is sealed. Operating conditions gamma five.”

Bashir flashed a knowing smile at Jake. “Fortunately, I've read the security operations manual. Computer: Permit access to this facility, authorization Bashir, Julian, operating condition beta one.”

This time the security light obediently turned from red to amber.

Jake whistled, impressed. “How did you get a security clearance?”

“I'm a physician,” Bashir said smugly as the door began to slide open. “It comes with the job. Automatically, it seems.”

A sudden crash and a strangled cry from inside startled them both.

Bashir didn't wait, so neither did Jake. They both threw themselves at the door before it was fully open and pushed their way into the room where—

—Jake felt his legs threaten to give out as he suddenly found himself facing Lieutenant Commander Worf and Lieutenant Commander Dax, both of whom were, to put it politely, out of uniform.

Bashir instantly spun around and with a quick apology literally leaped back into the corridor.

A second later, open-mouthed, Jake felt Bashir's hand on his arm as he was hauled out as well.

With a thunk, the door slid shut behind them. Only then did Jake risk looking at Bashir.

“Well,” Bashir said tersely, and Jake thought it was odd that a medical doctor would be disconcerted by the scene they'd just encountered, “they are married, after all.”

“I'll say,” Jake added. He wanted to say something more. He wanted to ask if Dr. Bashir had known Jadzia's Trill spots went all the way down to . . . but something in Bashir's face told him that not talking about what had just happened was what adults did. If only Nog were still his age and—

The door slid open again.

“You may now enter,” Worf growled at them.

Jake set his face on neutral and followed Bashir into the planning room. Worf and Jadzia were both back in uniform, and the large schematic padds were back on the planning table.

“Sorry to have . . . intruded,” Bashir murmured.

Jake had a sudden flash of inspiration, as he decided that part of the reason for the palpable tension in the room was that Bashir had always been after Jadzia for himself. Now that was a complication of being an adult that was exactly the same as being a teenager—always wanting what couldn't be had. Maybe there isn't all that much difference between us after all, Jake thought, as he suppressed the nervous grin that threatened to expose his unseasoned youth. He filed the revelation in his mind for accessing later, when he could more comfortably turn this extraordinary experience into something for a book. He was already full of ideas about how he could incorporate the whole scenario of traveling into the future into Anslem, the mostly autobiographical novel he had put aside a few years ago and to which he still returned sporadically when inspiration hit him.

“We have reviewed the schematics of the Phoenix,” Worf said stiffly.

A half-dozen different jokes sprang up unbidden in Jake's mind, but he pushed them down, followed Bashir's lead, and said nothing.

“Its weapons systems are impressive and adequate,” Worf continued. “However, its propulsion characteristics are . . . unusual.”

“They're Borg,” Bashir said.

“Transwarp?” Jadzia asked without the slightest trace of embarrassment in her manner or voice. Obviously, being a conjoined Trill had its advantages, Jake thought enviously.

“That's not how the engines were called out in the specs,” she said.

“Then maybe it's something beyond transwarp,” Bashir suggested. “But believe it or not, an hour ago I met a Borg in the corridor. She's a Starfleet admiral.”

“They're our allies,” Jake volunteered as he saw Worf's and Jadzia's surprised reactions. “They signed a treaty with the Federation.”

“Well,” Jadzia said after a moment's thought, “if the Phoenix's warp engines are based on Borg transwarp principles, then from the time they attacked Earth we know they've already demonstrated the ability to channel chronometric particles for propulsion. I would guess the ship is sound.”

Then Jadzia looked from Jake to Bashir, as if somehow her Trill senses or experience told her that the two of them could tell her something more about the Phoenix. “I'm going to guess you two have data we don't,” she said.

Bashir turned to Jake. “Mr. Sisko, tell it to them exactly as you told it to me.”

There was no way out, at least none that Jake could think of. So he told the same story he had told Dr. Bashir in the mess hall, about how he could always tell when Nog was lying, how he had sensed Nog was lying about his confidence in the mission of the Phoenix, and most importantly, that he thought he knew why Nog might have lied.

“And why is that?” Worf asked.

Feeling like a traitor and a turncoat, Jake stared down at the dirty floor of the planning room.

“I think Nog . . . I think Nog actually believes that the universe will end.”

No one responded to this statement, and after a few moments Jake glanced up to see that they were all waiting for him to go on.

“Just before that dinner we had,” he said, “at Starbase 53. I went up to him.”

“I remember that,” Jadzia said. “I thought you were having an argument.”

“We were. Sort of,” Jake confirmed. “Anyway, I told him that . . . well . . . that he hadn't really changed all that much in twenty-five years. That he was still the same old Nog—” Jake smiled briefly as he remembered that part of the conversation. “—well, older Nog. And that it was like things hadn't changed—I could still see when he was . . . well, he used to call it adapting the truth to close a sale.”

Bashir interrupted. “Jake—you told me that you told him flat out that he was lying.”

“I know,” Jake said defensively. “Okay, so that's what I told him. I told him I could tell he was lying to us when he said he had confidence in the Phoenix completing her mission.”

“And his response?” Jadzia prompted.

“I . . . I wish I could remember the exact words, Commander. He kind of got mad at me then.”

“Told you to keep your ridiculous hew-mon opinions to yourself?” Bashir prompted.

Jake nodded. “Yeah, something like that. And that there was really nothing to worry about. Then something about how he had seen how the river flowed, and that the balance could be restored.”

“Was that a reference to the Great Material River of Ferengi myth?” Worf asked sharply.

“I don't think they call it myth,” Jake said. “It's more like their religion.”

“And in their religion,” Jadzia said, “to say someone has seen how the Great Material River flowed is the same as saying they've seen the future.”

“That's right,” Jake said.

“And restoring the balance,” Bashir added, “is what happens when the River returns to its source, having completed its course. It's nothing less than the Ferengi apocalypse. The end of time, as it were.”

“Maybe . . . ,” Jadzia offered. “Maybe Nog's just feeling discouraged.”

“It doesn't matter what he's feeling,” Jake said glumly. “It's that he made a prediction, that he claimed to see the future.”

“I do not understand,” Worf said.

Jake didn't know where to begin. But Jadzia apparently did.

“Everyone knows the Ferengi culture is steeped in business customs,” she said to Worf. “Well, part of business is the ability to predict future market trends. So a Ferengi's business prowess—which would be the equivalent of how Klingons judge their own ability in battle—is one of those characteristics that gives him his reputation. As a result, Ferengi usually only make definitive predictions about the future—about how they've seen the ‘river’ flow—when they're absolutely certain what the outcome will be. And from the Ferengi point of view, the best way to know the outcome is to . . . well, stack the deck.”

Worf narrowed his eyes at Jadzia. “You seem to know a great deal about Ferengi culture,” he said heavily.

Jadzia shrugged. “So I dated one once. Some of them are kind of . . . cute.”

Worf grunted. Then he glared at Jake. “Do you really believe your friend Nog will sabotage the Phoenix in order to ensure the universe is destroyed?”

Jake held up his hands as if defending himself from a physical rather than a verbal attack. “Hey, I didn't say anything about sabotage!”

“But that's the only logical conclusion we can draw from what you've said,” Bashir said. “If this was one of your stories, Jake, what other motive could Nog have for what he said?”

Jake shook his head. “I . . . I don't know. But sabotage? That's different from just going into something without expecting it to succeed. Isn't it?”

Bashir patted Jake's back. “Look, that's all right. You've told us what you needed to tell us, and . . . if you're uncomfortable, you can go.”

All at once, Jake felt as if he were eight years old again and his father was putting him to bed just as the dinner party conversation was getting interesting. He felt his face heat up again, but this time in annoyance, not embarrassment.

“I'm not a kid anymore, Dr. Bashir. I want to get back home or stop this or do something as much as the rest of you.”

Jadzia put a restraining hand on Bashir's arm, and earned an annoyed look from her mate. “Jake, you do know that we can't go home, don't you?”

“Yeah, I know.”

“So the Phoenix is the best option we have for stopping the Ascendancy's plan,” Worf said with a touch of impatience.

“You mean, it might be,” Bashir cautioned. “First we have to be absolutely certain about Nog's motives.”

Jake rubbed his hands together in frustration. “If all of you are going to talk about motives, then what about this? If Nog had some plan to sabotage the Phoenix, why would he go to all the trouble of warping out to Starbase 53 to see us and then invite us onto the ship as its crew? I mean, we're a complication, aren't we?”

“That's a good point.” Jadzia looked pointedly at Bashir.

“Unless we are also a good cover for Nog's plans,” Worf said.

“We still don't know for sure what those plans are,” Bashir countered.

“We could argue about this for hours,” Jake said, looking at each of them in turn with frustration. Adults!

“We have to be certain about our next step,” Bashir told him.

“But why waste all this time and effort?” Jake persisted. “Why don't we just ask Nog what he's going to do?”

“You said you had already tried that,” Worf said.

“No. I said I thought he was lying. I didn't ask him why. And even if I had, there was no reason for him to give me a truthful answer.”

“If he had no reason to tell the truth to you then,” Jadzia asked, “what makes you think he'll tell the truth when you ask him again?”

“Because,” Jake said, “if we wait till tomorrow morning we'll be on his ship. And that will give us all the leverage we need. Tell the truth or . . .”

“You would propose to sabotage the ship yourself?” Worf growled.

“Commander,” Jake said seriously, “I don't believe that's what Nog is planning to do. So I do believe that he will do everything he can to keep us from damaging the Phoenix.”

“Everything he can,” Jadzia said thoughtfully. “Even tell the truth?”

“It's like my dad says,” Jake told her. “All we can do is hope.”

“That is not an inspiring plan to entrust the survival of the universe to,” Worf complained.

“No, it isn't,” Jadzia said as she slipped an arm around her mate's waist. “But for now, hope is all we have.”

Worf grunted again. “If that is true, Jadzia, then the universe is doomed.”